Sex, Communism and Other Subversive Activities
by lege et lacrima
Summary: NOTE: This story is in the process of being re-written and when it is finished it will be moved to AO3 and posted under the same title. I will add a chapter to the story letting you know when it is reposted. Thanks to everyone who read this :')
1. Happenings

Greetings all! This is a little something I cooked up in English, whilst thinking about the Cold War and my latest fandom obsession, Remus/Sirius. Remius? I don't know what it's usually known as. But I digress. This is an AU fic, maintaining the general plot of the Marauder story. And I've tried to be as true to the period as possible - any slang used has been consulted in my lovely, shiny and new slang dictionary. I have not read the Communist Manifesto, but it's not too essential to the plot. And yes, this is slash.  
At the moment, the rating is "T", but this is liable to change.

**Disclaimer**: The events presented in this work of fanfiction are based upon real events that happened in America in the mentioned time period, however the location and particulars are imagined by myself. None of the character names or place names belong to me - they are the sole property of J. K. Rowling.

* * *

1. Happenings

In the summer of 1945, before he started at high school, three things happened to James Potter.

The first happened on the sixth of August. He had slept in on most days of the holidays, as fifteen-year-olds tend to do over the summer break. He got up around midday, made himself a sandwich and then turned on the wireless. The States had just bombed a city in Japan, called Hiroshima, with a nuclear weapon. It had only just happened, but already reports of immense destruction and high death rates were being broadcast. James came from a staunch left-wing family, and his first feelings were those of anger and pity. But then he decided that he needed to do something.

The second thing that happened was that James Potter went, for the first time in his life, to the Hogsmeade Municipal Library. Like most fifteen-year-old boys, all he really wanted to read were comics. But now he wanted to understand politics. He wanted to know _why_. Such wanton acts of destruction were beyond his comprehension. Sure, in his comic books, people got shot all the time. But a _whole city_. The mind boggled. While at the library, James came upon one book that he hadn't been looking for, "_the Communist Manifesto_". And another first – James _borrowed _the book. He _read _it. He was_ interested _in it.

But perhaps more significant than these things was the third thing that happened. The world now cowered beneath the threat of nuclear warfare, Communism was on the rise as a new and alternative ideology, and James Potter was in love.

Lily Evans and her parents had just moved in to the house next door, and Lily was _beautiful_. She was tall – taller than James by a bit – and she had the most striking red hair. From the moment she gave James the finger for staring at her over the fence, he knew that she was the one for him.

These three things that happened didn't just affect James, obviously. There were naturally going to be run-on effects for his three best friends.

Sirius Black, James's best friend, had been equally shocked by Hiroshima. And his parents were right-wingers. He had borrowed the_ Manifesto _after James had read it, and then gave it back to James to return to the Library because he didn't think that he could stand the shame of being seen in there. And he conceded that Lily Evans was indeed quite pretty, but he did not fall hopelessly in love with her when she gave him the finger for staring at her over James's fence.

Remus Lupin was not quite James's best friend, but he got on well with Sirius so James let him hang around with them. He actually rather liked him, in the kind of way that you like an antique clock – with admiration and interest. Remus was appalled by Hiroshima, and had already prepared an article for the school newspaper, for which he was sure to be appointed to the editorial team the moment he started high school. He wasn't at all interested in James's discovery of the _Manifesto _– he had read it when he was eleven – nor was he impressed by the fact that James had actually been _inside_the Library. And he politely introduced himself to Lily Evans, who didn't give him the finger, but shook his hand.

Peter Pettigrew was not quite James's best friend either, but he was easy to be around so the three good friends didn't mind when he had attached himself to them back in middle school. He disapproved of Hiroshima, but he was pleased that it seemed to have finally ended the war. He wasn't interested in reading the _Manifesto_, but he was happy enough to have the others give him a summary. And he couldn't look over James's fence at Lily Evans, because he was too short, but James assured him that she was very beautiful indeed.

And on the first of September, the four friends started at Hogwarts, the local high school. James was delighted that Lily would be starting there too, and he refused to acknowledge that he only knew this because Remus had asked her.

But a blossoming relationship with Lily wasn't the first thing on James's mind. James wanted to focus his high school career not on romance or, heaven forbid, the pursuit of academic excellence, but on the making of mischief.

At middle school, he and Sirius had left their mark by letting off a stink bomb they'd made in science during an air raid drill towards the end of their last term there. They'd forgotten their nose plugs, but it didn't matter – the reaction was well worth the discomfort. Peter had laughed 'till he'd cried... or maybe those were just the noxious fumes making him weep. Remus had given them a disapproving speech, but he was smiling despite the smell.

So on their arrival at high school, they christened their three-year stay with turf across the top of the locker banks in the corridors. No-one knew where they'd gotten the turf from, or how they'd gotten it above the lockers. Peter laughed 'till he cried. Remus had given them a disapproving speech, but he'd planted some small flowers in the turf atop his locker before it had been removed by the janitor.

On their second day at Hogwarts, the second of September, the war had been declared to be over. So to celebrate, on their third day there, they drew the words "WAR - 1.9.'39 to 2.9.'45. R.I.P." in stolen chalk on the front steps of the school. Of course, their sentiments were not exactly in line with their words. But what did that matter, as long as it stirred up some trouble? Peter laughed 'till he cried. Remus had been reading the newspaper when they told him what they'd done; he simply nodded and kept reading.

If there was one thing (apart from all of his subjects at school) that Remus Lupin was good at, it was keeping his feelings to himself. So when the stink bomb went off in the air raid shelter, he told James and Sirius that it was very silly of them. He tried his utmost not to laugh at the looks on everyone's faces. And when they turfed the locker banks, he acted like it was an act of flagrant vandalism. Secretly, however, he thought it rather brightened the place up. He even planted some flowers above his locker.

And when they decorated the Hogwarts steps with their puzzling slogan, he tried to act like he wasn't interested, like it was just another prank, but he was actually quite scared. He was scared at how people would interpret the innocent joke, how they might lash out at James and Sirius. And he was scared by how America might now act towards the increasingly-Communist Russia, now that they no longer had any reason to be allies. For the one thing that Remus Lupin had been keeping to himself for longer than any other was his family's history: they were Russian immigrants. And no-one in Hogsmeade liked immigrants. Remus was as good as born and bred in America - they came when he was only one - and his parents pretended that they were too.

So with incredible foresight, before any anti-Russian furore could kick up, he decided that he _had _to tell his three closest friends his biggest secret.

"Remus, put down your newspaper," James demanded. "We've just written in chalk - _stolen _chalk - all over the school steps, and you haven't lectured us yet."

Remus looked up. "You've both been out of line, you should be very ashamed of yourselves, et cetera, what else do you want?"

Sirius frowned. "This isn't right."

Peter kept laughing.

"What's not right?" James asked.

"He's not himself. What's eating you?"

Remus smiled slightly, not looking up. "A dragon. It's massive and green and scaly, and..."

"Slow down!" James cried. "Get your head out of the clouds, boy! Sirius here seems to think something's bothering you, and I take him _very_seriously. So. What is it?"

Remus paused to think for a moment. "How would you react if I told you that I'm not from around here?"

"Not from Hogsmeade?" Peter mumbled offhandedly.

"Not from America," Remus said softly.

"From where, then?" Sirius asked.

"Russia." It was barely audible.

"That's FANTASTIC!" James exclaimed. "No _wonder _you'd already read the _Manifesto_! Oh, man. That is GREAT."

Sirius looked slightly more concerned. "You haven't told anyone else, have you?"

"No, I haven't."

He looked relieved. "I won't, either."

James nodded. "I see your angle. Not everyone would take it as well as us. I'll keep it quiet, then."

"Me too," said Peter, finally having gotten over his fit of giggles.

"You're the best sort of friends I could hope for," Remus said, putting his newspaper down.

Sirius grinned. "I always _knew _there was something funny about you, Lupin! Lupin... is that even your real name? Or is it _Lupinski_?"

"It's Lupin."

"How about _Lupinovabovovitz_?"

"No, it's just _Lupin_."

"Gosh darn you. How about _John_? Your middle name _can't _be John, can it? I bet it's _Josef_. It is, isn't it?"

"I'm pretty sure it's just John."

"Nonsense, your name is Remuski Josef Lupinovabovovitz," Sirius said in his posh accent. It was sometimes easy to forget that he too wasn't from Hogsmeade, and indeed, wasn't entirely from America. The story went that his Bostonian mother had run away from her restrictive family to England, fallen for a young aristocrat, fallen pregnant and fallen straight into another restrictive family. After the second child, Regulus, was born, they moved back to America, to Hogsmeade, but not before England had taken its toll on young Sirius's accent.

"We can be immigrants together, Comrade Josef," he said, sitting down next to Remus and picking up the newspaper.

Remus began to protest, but all Sirius did was take out the sports section and fold it into a paper hat.

In their third week of high school, James and Sirius began to circulate somewhat nasty cartoons of their least favourite teachers. They would sit in classrooms at lunch painstakingly drawing their caricatures. Peter would laugh 'till he cried all over some of their paper and they forced him to go and sit in a corner. And Remus? Remus sat quietly by the ebullient cartoonists, picked up their finished drawings and added captions.

And like any good team of troublemakers, they soon garnered their fair share of enemies. But more than any of the teachers, they were despised the most by a boy in their own grade, Severus Snape. Severus was rude and arrogant, and they took an almost instant dislike to him. James hated him for his politics and his advances on Lily. Sirius hated him for his greasy hair and frankly stupid-looking nose. Peter hated him because James and Sirius hated him. But Severus overlooked all of this, because of the four of them, he disliked Remus the most.

Remus didn't hate him. Remus, in fact, couldn't have cared less about him. But Severus was no idiot, he saw the way James, Peter and especially Sirius looked out for him. They were all strong boys - what Peter lacked in height he made up for in width - but Remus, the youngest of them, was feeble and skinny, and looked ill every other day. And Severus wasn't one to miss an easy target, nor, it seemed, were a lot of other boys in their grade.

The protruding foot, rightly placed for someone engrossed in a book to trip over, was bad enough, but the verbal taunts were what Remus came to fear the most. And so towards the end of their first year at Hogwarts, Sirius and James decided that something had to be done. Up until then, their pranking had been mostly generalised, apart from the occasional cartoon poking fun at a teacher. But they decided that they now needed a status change, from the strange kids who got in trouble a lot to a force to be reckoned with - and the best way to do that was to eliminate the competition.

Remus wasn't entirely sure what they were doing half the time, but slowly, the other kids began to leave him alone. It was tantamount to a minor miracle. Well, all the religious people in the town probably _would _have proclaimed it a miracle. Peter did - and he was the world's most unobservant Christian (but a Christian nonetheless).

Eventually, James and Sirius got their wish. Feared by students and the banes in the lives of teachers, they became a force to be reckoned with. Remus didn't waste time by pointing out to them that it really ought to be "a force with which to be reckoned", but Sirius told him to shut up and enjoy the idiom and the power which it was associated with.

"With which it is associated."

"Shut the hell up."

Their second year passed mostly without incident. Well, that is, if you ignored most of the pranks that they pulled. Peter even started to become a more active participant, rather than just laughing on the sidelines.

In the summer break before their third and final year at Hogwarts high, three things happened to James Potter, now a far more sophisticated seventeen-year-old.

The persecution of Communists in America was blossoming, and James was afraid for the political ideology that he held so dear. So he decided that he needed to do something. He needed to form one of the subversive organisations he heard about on the wireless so often.

So the second thing that happened was James's belated second visit to the Hogsmeade Municipal Library. He picked up "_the Communist Manifesto_" again and read it at the Library, and this time he took notes.

But once again the third thing that happened rather outstripped these two things. Because James Potter had asked Lily Evans out on a date. And she'd said yes.

Sirius agreed with James that some sort of subversive organisation needed to be formed. He too re-read the _Manifesto_. This time, he even went to the Library himself, seeing as James had told him that borrowing it was far too suspicious. And he was very pleased for James. Maybe, just maybe, he thought, James would shut up about Lily now that she'd finally caved in. How wrong he was.

Peter was all for the forming of a subversive organisation - it sounded like fun. He also went and read the _Manifesto _at the Library. Well, he skim-read it, at least. And now that he actually knew what Lily looked like, he too was pleased for James, if not a little jealous.

Remus was mildly cautious about forming a subversive organisation - the word _subversive_, being bandied about by James and Sirius, didn't exactly help. But he agreed nonetheless. While his parents were hiding all their Russian and generally left-wing books in the basement, he smuggled the _Manifesto _into his bedroom and re-read it by candlelight at night.

Remus _would _have been very excited about James's impending date with Lily - Lily was a very nice girl and James was lucky to finally have his wishes fulfilled - but he was rather distracted by something that had happened within the confines of his own heart, an unusual event in itself. For one day in the holidays, he had been at Sirius's house, sitting on Sirius's excessive four-poster bed, flipping through a pin-up magazine.

"I'll never be able to get with any of these pin-up girls," he joked, "because James and I are like an old married couple, so Peter says."

"But James has Lily," Remus pointed out.

"True," Sirius conceded. "Well I'll just have to marry _you _then."

Remus blushed. "Sirius! No church would marry two heretics like us, let alone two _men_!"

Sirius scoffed. "You're only saying that because you don't want to admit just how madly in love with me you are."

"I am not!" Remus protested.

"You are so!" Sirius grabbed him and wrestled him onto his back. "Admit it!"

"I'm not!"

"You Russian boys," Sirius said with mock-exasperation, "you're all so _stubborn_."

"You don't know any other Russian boys," Remus pointed-out.

"Oh, shut up," Sirius said, his accent more pronounced than ever. He planted a kiss on Remus's cheek, before sitting up and going nonchalantly back to the pin-ups.

It was a moment before Remus righted himself, and he was amazed that Sirius could just go back to what he was doing so easily. Remus couldn't. He wasn't sure he ever could.

So the next day, when James told him about his date with Lily, all he could really do was wonder why he had reacted the way he did to a simple kiss on the cheek. Sirius would have brushed his teeth at least once since then - but Remus couldn't bring himself to wash his face.

* * *

What did you think? I'd be greatly honoured if you left me a review - considering how epic-massive this fandom is, I'm expecting at least ONE person who doesn't have me (and Lacrima) on alert already. :)

GO GO GO!

- _Legs_


	2. Formation

Chapter two is upon us! For those of you still hanging out for me to post "Between Love and Hate", be patient, it'll come. I've just had bursts of inspiration with this story, so I'm churnin' 'em out. Enjoy!

**Disclaimer**: I don't own Harry Potter, HUAC or the songs of the Andrews Sisters.

* * *

2. Formation 

"You're kidding me!" Remus cried. James, Sirius and Peter didn't tend to pay attention to Remus when he was reading the newspaper, but this time, he was going to _force _them to pay attention.

"This is an outrage!"

"I agree," James said, "Lily's holding out on me for this weekend. It's almost as though one date is enough for her, and then she moves on."

Remus rolled his eyes. He didn't want to mention that after the way James had allegedly acted on their first date, Lily may have had good cause for holding out on him. "Not that," he said, "I'm just reading about this thing in the paper... ten prominent Hollywood figures have been charged for contempt of congress by HUAC. What a load of rubbish!"

"Slow down there," Sirius said, "what the heck is a _HUAC_?"

"The House Committee on Un-American Activities," Remus explained.

"That doesn't spell HUAC," Sirius said grumpily. "Evidently those pollies never passed their finals."

"They re-arrange it," Remus said hurriedly, "but the acronym is not what matters. I mean, honestly, Ring Lardner Junior's among them. This is a basic contravention of the 1st amendment."

"Who's this Ring fellow?" Peter asked.

"He's a screenwriter, one of the best," Remus said.

Sirius grabbed the paper from Remus. "He's also the best-looking of the bunch," he pointed out. Remus blushed and shot Sirius a sharp look.

"What?" Sirius said. "I think it's a _crime _for good-looking people to be arrested. Honestly, if _I _were arrested... now _that _would be terrible."

James laughed. "I think we'd cope."

"Not if you were arrested for thinking differently to those in power," Remus piped up hotly. "That is just _wrong_."

"Yeah," Peter said, "it would be like any of us getting sent to Dumbledore's office for thinking that he had an odd taste in facial hair."

"A bad excuse for an analogy, but a valid point nonetheless," Sirius joked. Peter frowned.

"You know what this means, don't you?" James said suddenly, getting the I'm-Going-To-Try-Asking-Lily-Out-Right-This-Very-Moment glint in his eyes.

"Funnily enough, I don't," Sirius mumbled, but James paid no heed to him.

"It means we're going to have to start our subversive organisation."

"You've been talking about this for almost a month now," Remus said, "are you finally going to put your plan into action?"

"Of course," James said in a hushed voice. "So for any subversive organisation, we need a name."

"We need to take action!" Remus cried, running a hand through his hair in frustration.

James fixed him with a strong glare. "Before our subversive organisation can form, _we need a name_."

"The Subversives," Peter suggested.

"That's crap and you know it," James said.

"The Hogsmeade Front Against Unjust Persecution?" Remus ventured.

"Only _you_, Remus, only _you_," Sirius laughed, sitting down next to Remus, far closer than Remus thought was necessary.

"We need something that isn't too obvious, nor too wordy. It needs to be snappy, something that will stick in your mind. And it needs to encapsulate our purpose in its entirety."

"Which is?" Sirius asked. "You've told us very little about this hypothetical organisation."

"Well, general shit-stirring in the pursuit of justice for those wrongly persecuted."

There was silence for a moment, before Sirius suddenly jumped up, and burst out with a loud "aha!"

"Got something?" James said.

"The Marauders," Sirius said. "Think about it; it implies a certain degree of shit-stirring and the contempt for authority that we so _obviously _harbour, as well as a sense of action."

"That's perfect! Fantastic!" James enthused, practically jumping up and down in excitement.

"Everything sounds better in an English accent," Remus joked.

Sirius's eyes flickered onto Remus briefly with a grin, and Remus looked away as quickly as he could.

"That's settled, then," James said. "Welcome, brothers, to the Marauders."

Peter jiggled happily. "This is so good!"

James nodded. "Now, to particulars. I'm the President, obviously, because it was my idea."

"And girls love a man who's in charge and knows it," Sirius added.

James flushed red. "Lily's got her head in the right place. She needs to know I'm taking action. NOW, Sirius, you're the Vice-President, because every good leader needs a right-hand man, and I'm pretty sure you're right-handed."

Sirius chuckled. "I was last time I checked. How about these two, then?"

"Comrade Josef will have to be the Treasurer, because he's the smart one."

"One, James, I don't like being stereotyped as _the smart one_," Remus snapped, "and two, _how many times _do I have to tell you not to call me that?" Sirius had started calling Remus "Comrade Josef" as a joke, but the name had stuck, much to the aforementioned Comrade's annoyance.

"You can tell me as often as you like; it'll make no difference," James said.

"What about me?" Peter asked. "What do _I_get to be?"

"You can be the Secretary, because I'm not entirely sure what they do," James said.

Peter cheered, seemingly oblivious to the fact that he had just been quite cruelly insulted.

James stuck his right hand out. "To the Marauders."

"The Marauders," Peter chirped eagerly, sticking his chubby hand atop James's.

"The Marauders," Remus said, placing his hand above Peter's, "and here's hoping we don't get caught doing all of this."

"The Marauders," Sirius echoed, "the greatest shit-stirrers in the history of shit-stirring."

Sirius placed his hand on Remus's, and a slight shiver went up his spine. He barely noticed as the two hands beneath his lifted his up into the air, and then when it fell down to his side.

"Right, that's that, then," said James, smiling contentedly.

" Hold on just a second!" Remus said. "What happened to _taking action_? Having a name for our group and pretentious titles isn't _nearly _enough!"

" Alright then, _Treasurer_," James spat, "what do _you _think we should do?"

Remus shrugged. He hadn't exactly got that far in his thoughts yet. He had hoped that James and Sirius would come up with some wonderful plan, some deus ex machina, as they were often so wont to do. His machinations, however, were interrupted by a voice from a few metres away.

"What are you lot doing over here, making so much noise?" rang out the cold voice of Severus Snape.

"None of your business, Snivellus," James snarled, not even bothering to turn his head.

"I don't appreciate your little pet-name for me, Potter," he snarled right back. "I only came to enquire because one can hear your cries of jubilation from across the schoolyard. And we all know that no good can come of happiness within your ranks."

"Shove off, you greasy turd," Sirius spat. "Like Potter said, it's none of your business."

"Yeah!" Peter squeaked. "Why don't you go crawl back in your hole and leave us alone?"

Severus smirked. "I notice _you're _not jumping to the aid of your friends, Lupin."

"I have more important things to do than waste my energy caring about your existence," Remus said nonchalantly, picking up the newspaper again and flicking to the page he'd been on before.

"Like reading the news?" Severus said with a laugh. "Checking up on your Communist buddies?"

For a while now, Severus had assumed that Remus's fatal flaw was being "Un-American", and took every opportunity to use it as a taunt. Before Remus could retort that he wasn't (much of) a Communist, Sirius stepped forward, coming face to face with Severus.

"_You_," he said, poking a finger into Severus's chest, "you leave him out of this. Remus has done nothing wrong."

Severus laughed. It was a cruel, harsh laugh, the laughter of one who didn't know what real mirth sounded like. "_Done nothing wrong_?" he mocked. "You call a hate of Democracy _doing nothing wrong_?"

Without warning, Sirius stepped back slightly from his position in front of Severus, and swung his right fist out, making forceful contact with Severus's jaw. "I told you to leave him out of it, you fucker."

Severus stumbled back, his hands gripping his jaw. He looked like he would have been in a lot of pain - but he was clearly overplaying it.

"Sirius!" Remus said, jumping up and instinctively restraining Sirius's right arm - this wasn't the first time the most firey of the boys had found it in himself to lash out on somebody.

"The little shit deserved that, Remus," Sirius said.

"That'll teach you to mess with us," James said.

Suddenly there was a dark shadow looming over all of them. "That will be _quite _enough, boys."

"Ah! Miss McGonnagal!" Peter said, squirming. Their English teacher, as well as the Head of their Grade, was a fearsome spinster by the name of Minerva McGonnagal. For a woman in her late fifties, she cut an imposing figure. She was probably a graduate of some etiquette school or other, with an accent to rival Sirius's, and her thin lips were much more pursed than usual at this particular moment.

"_What_is going on here?" she demanded.

"He insulted Remus!" Sirius said, in a voice that was probably supposed to sound outraged, but just came out scared and pathetic. "He said that he hated Democracy!"

"He really doesn't," James added pleadingly.

"That is no excuse to _hit _someone, Mr. Black," McGonnagal said, ignoring James entirely.

Severus smirked.

"My office, Black, now," she said. Severus's smirk grew broader. "You too, Snape."

He scowled.

"And Potter, Lupin, Pettigrew... I suppose you had better come along too."

The five boys trudged along behind McGonnagal, anger in their faces. Well, Peter looked rather confused about the whole thing, and Remus just looked exasperated. James and Sirius were clearly bursting with rage, whereas Severus was more bubbling over with it.

Half an hour and a strict talking-to later, the Marauders left McGonnagal's office with a week of after-school detentions for James, two days for Peter, two weeks of detentions and a passing comment that he really ought to cut his hair for Sirius, and a pardon for Remus, who - quite rightly - was recognised as not having done anything wrong.

"This is rubbish," Sirius said. "I don't deserve two weeks for giving that bastard what he had coming anyway."

"Sirius," Remus said in his best level-headed voice, "we fight injustice with words - and occasionally pictures - not with violence."

"Don't you _care _that he said all those awful things about you?"

"Of _course _I care," Remus said, "I just don't think you should get _yourself _in trouble over an insult directed at _me_."

"An insult directed at you is an insult directed at all of us," Sirius stated plainly.

Remus blushed slightly. It was as though Sirius was reminding him how lucky he was to have such fantastic friends. As if he would ever forget.

But there was another thought, picking away at the back of his mind - it was almost as though Sirius was defending his honour in a spectacular act of Medieval chivalry, which led to thoughts of romance, and of _that _kiss on the cheek. Remus frowned and led that little train of thought down a tunnel to the back of his mind. It was not something he should have been thinking about.

"Come on, gang, don't let this put you out," James said. "This is nothing. The rest of the year, this is only going to get better. The hell we will raise, the shit we will stir..."

Peter shuddered. "Yeah, but I don't want to get any more detentions that I've already copped!"

"A hazard of the job, I'm afraid, my dear boy," Sirius said, slapping Peter jovially on the back.

"Peter's got a point," Remus said, "perhaps we need to be quite cautious about getting caught from now on. I mean, people have been arrested for less than what we're planning."

"What _are _we planning?" James said. "I mean, you haven't exactly come up with a plan for us yet, _Treasurer_."

"You know what we need to do?" Sirius interjected, coming to Remus's aid again. "We need to go to the Shack."

James and Peter both got excited looks on their faces. The Shrieking Shack was a cottage just out of town. It was a short drive, but it was work it, because it was never frequented by anyone other than themselves. Everyone in Hogsmeade was sure it was haunted, but the boys knew better - they'd been there on and off since they were eleven, on their bikes, and more recently in Sirius's car - a present from his parents for his recent eighteenth birthday.

"I don't know," Remus said, "surely we shouldn't..."

But his protestations were drowned out by James and Peter shouting their assent.

"That's settled, then," Sirius said. "We'll head out this weekend. And before you say anything, Remus, you can damn well bring your homework with you."

Remus sighed. How was it that Sirius could always second-guess him?

And so it was that that very weekend, on Saturday morning, they piled into Sirius's Ford, their overnight bags stacked haphazardly in the boot. The drive wasn't too long, which was a small mercy. James had an annoying tendency to sing on long car rides, and after his fourth rendition of "Bei Mir Bist Du Schoen" dedicated to "the marvellous" Lily Evans, Remus was regretting ever lending him that dusty old Andrews Sisters record.

Sirius, who was at the wheel, was not a particularly skilled driver. He kept swerving, and Remus was all too aware that Peter, next to him in the back seat, could turn and spill his guts over Remus's best trousers, which he was _really _regretting wearing.

Mercifully, the drive passed without any car crashes, vomit or excess of flat notes, and they got to the Shack soon after one in the afternoon. As was usual, they set up camp in the lounge room of the desolate dwelling, spreading the contents of their cases over the rotting couches. The wooden floorboards were uncomfortable, but James was constant in his affirmation that no greatness arose without a great struggle. Their struggle, it seemed, was getting through a night of sore bottoms and strange noises from the other side of the room.

"So," James said, getting out a pen and notebook, scrawling "TOP SECRET" on the first page before flicking to the second to write. "Any ideas yet, boys?"

"James, we've only just got here!" Peter said. "But since you ask, how about the classic smoke bomb ruse?"

Remus shook his head. "This isn't petty disruption, Peter. This is different to the usual formula. We're not trying to make people cough, we're trying to make them think."

Sirius nodded vigorously. "We also need something wide-reaching, not just confined to one arena."

"A pamphlet, then," James suggested.

There was a contemplative silence.

"We need people to know the name 'the Marauders'," he continued, "without necessarily knowing who they are. So we need to get the name out there! We need to distribute our literature!"

"We can use the mimeo in the _Hogwarts Bugle_," Remus said. "I have a key."

"Wouldn't that be an abuse of your privileges as the Editor?" Sirius asked, trying to sound disapproving as Remus often was of their schemes, but barely managing to disguise his approval.

Remus raised an eyebrow. "Have you got any better ideas?"

"_This _is why you're the Treasurer!" James said.

"They generally deal with pecuniary matters," Remus muttered, but James would not allow his bubble to be burst.

"I think we've left something kinda important out," Peter said.

James scoffed. "What could we have left out?"

"Well, what exactly is gonna be in these pamphlets, for one..."

There was another silence, this exponentially more awkward than the last.

"We'll sleep on it," James decided. "Our brains have been at it overtime, we deserve a rest."

Remus mumbled something that sounded distinctly like "we've only just got here", but he raised no objections, and got out his History textbook.

The rest of the afternoon was passed most unproductively. As Remus half-heartedly did his homework, James spoke excitedly and unrelentingly to Peter about his latest plans to win Lily's heart (and virginity, if he got his way). Sirius was scribbling possible logos for the Marauders in his sketchbook.

At about six in the evening, James decreed that it was time for dinner, and pulled out some sandwiches his mother had kindly made for the four of them. By now, the roast beef had gone cold and the fat was congealed around the edges, making the mustard taste rancid, but it was good enough fare for the four boys.

"Then," James said with a mouth full of bread, "I'll serenade her from across the fence. You lot can watch from a distance. I wouldn't want you to mess it up for me."

Sirius snorted into his sandwich. "Like you wouldn't already mess it up enough on your own."

Anger flashed across James's face. "Oh yeah? Wanna bet? I'll prove it to you."

"How?" Sirius challenged.

"Get on the other side of the couch, my fair maiden, and I'll show you."

"_Oh _no, I'm not being Lily."

"Why not? Your hair is the longest of all of ours."

"No thanks to McGonnagal," Sirius scowled. "Remus should be Lily. He has the reddest hair."

"Excuse me!" Remus exclaimed. "My hair is not red!"

"It's redder than all of ours," Peter chimed in.

"Peter can be Lily!" Remus said.

"No!"

"Okay, okay," James said, "how about we just pretend that Lily is over there?"

There were murmurs of assent.

James stood up and cleared his throat. "Oh Lily, Lily," he crooned, "Lily make your mind up! It's time I knew just how I stand with you! My heart's no clock that I can stop and wind up..."

Remus rolled his eyes. "_More _Andrews Sisters."

"You should never have lent him that record," Sirius said, poking Remus's arm.

"Stop reading my mind," Remus said, more angrily than he'd intended.

"So Lily, Lily... Lily, time is fleeting, and here and there my hair is turning grey!"

Peter guffawed at that. Sirius cringed as James hit the top note.

"My mother has a fear wedding bells I'll never hear," he sang, but couldn't get any further, for the laughter that had been threatening to burst forth now sprung out in a torrent of sound. "I can never get past that line," he said, "it's too funny."

"Yeah, Lily would never marry you, anyway," Peter joked. James slapped him across the back of his head.

"You're an idiot, James," Sirius said, "any fool knows that serenading doesn't work."

"Hah, you speak as though you've had any experience in the matter," James said.

Choosing to ignore that comment, Sirius continued. "You don't beat around the bush, don't send her flowers and boxes of chocolate. You just grab her and give her a kiss."

"That wouldn't work," James said, "she'd have me arrested."

"You'd be surprised," Sirius said, at which Remus flushed (unnoticed, he hoped). "Once she sees what a good kisser you are, she'll change her mind."

"How do you know that I'm a good kisser?" James demanded.

"I'm making assumptions based on my own prowess in that area," Sirius said, confident as ever.

James laughed derisively. "Such high opinions of himself, the boy who's never kissed anyone."

"Neither have you!" Sirius said.

"So go on then, prove your theory."

"Do you want me to demonstrate on Remus?"

The words hit Remus like a slap across the face. He sat there gaping for a moment, before composing himself, and shouting his objection. "Sirius! Please don't!"

"I'm going to have to agree," James said. "Sirius, please don't."

"But who else am I going to demonstrate on?" he whined. "I mean, you're ugly as shit, and as for Peter, I _do _have a height restriction. I don't do bending down."

Peter and James both looked rightly indignant. "I'm not short!" Peter protested.

"And I'm not ugly!"

"Peter, you're short, stop arguing. And James, let's face it, you're no Remus..."

"Sirius, stop it!" Remus said, incredibly uncomfortable. Sirius was obviously just joking around, but it hit too close to home for Remus's liking. He had been so far successful in pushing those irrational, irrational thoughts to the back of his mind, but with the way that Sirius was speaking, they were threatening to surface.

"Fine," Sirius said, "I won't demonstrate on _anyone_."

"Good," James said. "I guess we'll just have to call your theory inconclusive."

They didn't speak to each other for the rest of the evening. James went on filling Peter in on his plans for his and Lily's future, and Sirius drew a picture on the inside of Remus's History textbook. It was rather annoying, Remus thought. He needed the steady drone of his two noisiest friends bantering. It was like pleasant background noise.

In fact, they didn't speak to each other again until midnight. Remus couldn't sleep - he was trying so very hard not to think about Sirius as anything other than a good friend, and so he was reading the newspaper. And that was when he had an idea.

"You lot, wake up!" he shouted rather louder than he needed have.

The others reluctantly stirred from their sleep. "What is it?" Peter grumbled.

"Our pamphlets," Remus said, "don't need to educate people about us, our organisation. They need to educate them of their own ignorance. We need to start our own blacklists."

And at that, all earlier arguments were put aside, and in the dead of the night, the Marauders began plotting...

* * *

So I've noticed a lot more people have alerted this fic than reviewed it. I'd love it if you took the time to leave me a review... they mean the world to me. :)

And just so you know, "Bei Mir Bist Du Schoen" and "Joseph, Joseph" are two of my favourite songs. Absolute classics. And I'm just throwing them around to demonstrate my copious knowledge of 1940s music, of course... (they were actually released in 1937...)

With love,

- _Legs_


	3. Blacklisting

Oh, look, another chapter! This one isn't as long as the first two, sorry, but I've got exams this coming week and I had a bit more I could have tacked onto the end, but decided I'd rather not. It'll make sense once you read the end, trust me.  
Thank you so much to everyone who's been reading and enjoying this so far; your reviews mean the world to me. :)  
Hope you enjoy this chapter!

**Disclaimer**: Quite obviously not mine.

**Warning**: There are lots of strong political opinions in this chapter. It may not be your cup of tea, but don't be hating. These are characters in a work of fan fiction - i.e., harmless.

* * *

3. Blacklisting

Remus Lupin was about to do the worst, most reprehensible, terrible thing he had ever even _contemplated _doing. He was about to tell an outright lie. To a teacher. He hadn't wanted to do it, he'd raised every objection at first, but James had reminded him that using the _Hogwarts Bugle _mimeograph was his idea in the first place, and Sirius had said it was the only way they'd be able to print their still-hypothetical blacklists without arousing suspicion. And, really, everything sounded better in a English accent...

"You've lost your keys?" Miss McGonnagal echoed, thin eyebrows raised. "That's not like you at all, Remus, you're usually a very responsible boy."

Remus blushed. "I just... they must have slipped out of my bag..."

McGonnagal nodded. "Very well. You're a good Editor of the _Bugle_. I'll see if we can get you another one cut."

"Thank you so very much," Remus said, probably more gushing than he should have been.

"Now, off you run to your next class," she said, eyeing him with some confusion.

"That wasn't that hard, was it?" James asked after school as they were walking towards his house.

"It was awful," Remus scowled, "I feel so bad for betraying her trust like that."

The other three laughed.

"Laugh all you like," Remus said, "but it wasn't nice."

"Really, now," Sirius said, slinging a casual arm over Remus's shoulder, "I know we forced you to upset your moral code for us, but it'll make it so much easier..."

"Yeah, once we decide what to do with our blacklists," James muttered.

"We'll discuss it once we get back to your house," Peter said hastily.

James's mother greeted them at the door with freshly baked cookies. "Your ma's such a cliché," Sirius mumbled, but thankfully James didn't hear. He grabbed the plate of cookies with a mumbled "thanks" and dashed up the stairs to his room, the others following close behind. Remus glanced apologetically over his shoulder at Mrs. Potter, but she was already on her way back to the kitchen.

"Right, then," James said, getting out his "TOP SECRET" notebook and flipping to a clean page as they sat down on his abnormally large bed. "Blacklists. We need ideas."

"We shouldn't call it a blacklist," Sirius suggested, "it's too, uh... well, it's been done."

James nodded, and wrote down "not a blacklist".

"The name could be a pun on 'blacklist'," Peter suggested tentatively.

"Wow, Peter," James said with a hint of sarcasm, "you don't _usually _come up with such good ideas!"

Peter grinned.

"Redlist," Sirius said offhandedly.

"What, because we're a bunch of Communists?" Remus quipped. "We needn't be so obvious."

"Yellowlist!" Peter said.

"I hate yellow," James grumbled.

"I like yellow," Peter said, but no-one really paid any attention. Because Remus had his thinking face on.

"So the 'black' in 'blacklist'," he began, "implies some sort of enemy. But what _we're _attacking is not the idea that there are enemies in America, but that these people who call themselves true Americans are the enemies... of freedom of thought and association. So how about..."

There was a palpable silence as Remus was evidently deciding whether what he was going to say would be appropriate or not.

"... how about Red, White and Bluelists?"

Peter nodded appreciatively. James said "that's fantastic, that is!"

"I really do love you," Sirius said casually.

Remus blushed furiously. "No you don't," he said.

Peter was contemplating his toes, and James said hastily "okay, so we've got our title. Now we need some content. We need to Red, White and Bluelist us some people."

"I can think of _so _many," Sirius said, "but I think Snivellus should take pride of place at the top of the list."

"No!" Remus said, alarmed. The others looked at him curiously. "Think about it," he continued, "everyone knows we don't particularly see eye-to-eye with him, -" Sirius scoffed, as though this were a criminal understatement, "- so if we put him on the top of the list, it'd be traceable. And we don't want that, do we?"

"Voice of reason," James said, "what would we do without you?"

"We'd probably get arrested, or something!" Peter said with a laugh.

"Well, here's hoping not," James said, suddenly looking slightly nervous at the thought. Peter immediately sobered up his expression.

"I'd go to jail for the cause," Sirius said strongly, "show them I'm serious."

"We know you're Sirius," Remus joked, "but thanks for the reminder."

As Sirius laughed loudly, James said "that's easy for you to say. You've got lousy parents, a brat of a brother and no real ideas about your future other than fighting for justice or whatever it is you plan to do. Me, I've got plans, I've got a family to think about. My parents. Lily. All the children we're going to have."

"You fucker," Sirius snapped, his face suddenly red with anger, "I've got _you _lot."

James looked as though he'd been slapped in the face. "Sorry," he mumbled, "I didn't think."

"You _don't _think," Sirius said, still red in the face, but with a softer tone.

"I, uh," Peter began, trying to cut through the atmosphere, "I think we should maybe think of some people to put on the list."

"Good idea, Peter," Remus said, glad for the interruption. He couldn't believe that James had been so insensitive. He also couldn't believe that he was clearly taking sides in this little argument that was now being patched up as though nothing had happened. Usually, he would just have thought that James was lovestruck by Lily and didn't really consider that anyone else had feelings, which was a normal, day-to-day occurrence, but this time he was inexplicably really rather angry with James. And it had nothing to do with the blush that spread through Sirius's cheeks, bringing colour to his pale face for all the wrong reasons. Nothing at all.

"The Malfoys are an obvious choice for the list, then," James said. "Lucius just got all this money from his dead father - who he probably poisoned, by the way - and I heard from Frank who works at the milk bar that he's planning on opening an antiques dealership with that harpy of a wife of his."

"Put them down, then," Sirius said. James responded enthusiastically, scratching his pencil across the page.

"How about the Carrows?" Peter said. "They live next door to me, and they're pretty creepy."

"Creepy's not a good enough reason," James said dismissively. "Known anti-Communist sympathies?"

"Well, yeah," Peter said, sounding offended, "otherwise I wouldn't have suggested them."

"Good man, good man," James said, slapping Peter on the back with one hand and scribbling down "Amycus and Alecto Carrow" with his other.

"How about that Macnair fellow?" Remus said. "You know, the one who works at the jail. He comes into our bookshop sometimes and buys all sorts of odd things; books about... I don't know, my parents don't give me the particulars. But from what I gather, he's very anti-Communist."

"Walden Macnair," James said aloud as he wrote. "This is great, keep 'em coming..."

"Oh, shit!" Sirius exclaimed. "We've forgotten our most important enemy!"

After a considerable silence, in which Sirius looked at the other three as though they were idiots for not realising this glaring omission. "Mayor Riddle!"

"Of course!" Remus gasped. "Put him down, James, right now."

James hastily wrote "Mayor Tom Marvolo Riddle" on the list.

"Why didn't we think?" he said, mostly to himself. "I mean, Riddle's _awful_!"

Within twenty minutes, they had over fifteen names on their list, Severus Snape included. James and Sirius, their little moment of animosity as good as never having happened, were inspecting it with the utmost pride.

"This is going to be brilliant," Sirius said, "we'll be the talk of the town!"

"Yeah!" James cried. "People will be cursing us! 'The Marauders,' they'll say, 'I hate those asses!' "

Peter laughed loudly at his stupid put-on accent, no doubt meant to be an imitation of Severus's deep and slimy voice.

"Bloody fantastic," Sirius said, "eh, Remus? You should be proud to be putting your brains to such good use!"

"Do you know what, Sirius? I bloody am."

The next morning, several hours before school started, the Marauders had snuck in and were using the mimeograph in the _Hogwarts Bugle _office to run off copies of their beautifully-designed leaflets. (For the first round, they had decided against full pamphlets, preferring to have this first leaflet as something of a taster.) The black-and-white pages were adorned with a flowing American flag in the top left corner, and the words "The Marauders present the 1st edition of the _Red, White and Bluelist_" across the top. The capital "R" in "Red" was backwards. Below the heading were the words "Bringing you the latest news on suspected anti-Communists, un-un-Americans and violators of basic human rights", followed by the fifteen-odd names, with "Mayor Tom Marvolo Riddle" right at the top, and "Severus Snape" down the bottom. And in the bottom right corner was a drawing that Sirius had done of a man (who rather resembled Mayor Riddle) reading the leaflet, looking highly indignant.

"I love us," James kept saying as he turned the crank of the mimeo, "and I love Lily Evans."

He felt he had to keep repeating this last part, as he had volunteered to work the mimeo so he could get some muscles to show off to Lily. Sirius had made a crack that he usually left the menial tasks to Peter, but James had insisted on doing it himself. His mantra served to remind him that his hard work was all in the name of love.

Remus sat atop the desk at the opposite end of the office. He was almost-unconsciously watching Sirius bantering with James. Sirius's slightly wavy black hair that was far, far too long was falling about his face, and his grey eyes were boring a hole through the floor near James's feet. Part of his appeal, Remus thought absently, was that he never really looked anyone in the eyes when he spoke to them; not unless he was irascibly angry with them, or passing them by for a few fleeting moments. It was a pity, because Remus really quite wanted to look at his eyes. He wondered for a moment what Sirius's eyes would look like close-up, mere inches away from his own.

"Idiot!" he muttered. What was he doing thinking these things?

"What was that, Remus?" Sirius asked, turning his head towards Remus.

"Ah, nothing," Remus said quietly, refusing to meet Sirius's gaze. What was he now, a mind-reader?

Sirius walked over to where Remus was sitting. "You're not having second thoughts, are you?"

"What? No! Of course not! How could I?"

"Good," Sirius said, "just checking. You seem... I don't know. Uh... fretful."

"Fretful?" Remus repeated, the corners of his mouth twitching.

"Well, like you think we'll be discovered or something. We won't, by the way."

"I know," Remus said, "it's not that."

Sirius sat up on the desk next to Remus, the latter of whom had to stop himself from jumping aside in an attempt to control his undignified thoughts. Over the other side of the room, Peter and James were laughing at some no-doubt lewd joke, and seemed oblivious to the fact that the other half of their merry band were having a quiet discussion just across the room.

"I know you worry sometimes," Sirius said softly, "and I can understand that, what with your ancestral affliction. But just think... by tomorrow you'll be able to bask in the private glory of our infamy!"

Remus forced himself to smile. How could he tell Sirius that he wasn't stressing over his "ancestral affliction" or their rule-breaking, but his somewhat unnatural feelings for him that he would really rather not think about, thanks.

"Would you like me to serenade you?" Sirius whispered, so softly that Remus almost didn't understand what he'd said.

"James seems to think it works," Sirius continued, "seems to think it cheers people up. So come on. I'm sure if I try hard enough I could remember the words to those Android Sisters songs."

"It's the _Andrews _Sisters," Remus corrected, "and please don't embarrass yourself further."

If Remus had been looking at Sirius's eyes at that point, which he obviously _wasn't_, he would have noticed the wickedness the flickered over them. And Sirius jumped up off the desk and cleared his throat.

"No!" Remus cried, jumping off the desk and flinging his hand over Sirius's mouth before he could let any words escape it. A muffled sort of humming noise was pushing through his fingers, but he had the other hand on Sirius's shoulder, pressing down so that he could keep his balance.

"What's going on over there?" Peter asked.

"He's trying to serenade me," Remus said, trying to sound disdainful, but coming out sounding more amused.

"Well keep his mouth shut," James said in between cranks of the mimeo, "he's a rubbish singer."

"I'm not bad!" Sirius tried to say, but through Remus's fingers it sounded more like "idoddad!"

"He does look like that guy who sings at the Hog's Head on Fridays," Peter said, not giving the others any time to wonder why he knew what went on in the Hog's Head on Fridays, "Steve Boardman."

"Not old Stubby Boardman?" James said, suddenly distracted from his cranking. "He looks nothing like Sirius!"

"Does too!" Peter protested. "They could be brothers!"

"One is enough, thanks," Sirius said, his words coming out clearly now that Remus's grip had slackened. Sirius took advantage of this and made a bid for freedom, but Remus caught his arm.

"You will _not _serenade me, resemblance to Stubby Boardman not withstanding."

"I don't look like him," Sirius moaned, but Remus shot him down with a glare. For a brief moment their eyes met, and Sirius's grey eyes bored into Remus's hazel ones with such intensity that Remus thought he might as well just melt into the ground, there and then.

And then Sirius grinned. A bad sign in itself, but when it was followed by him taking Remus's hands and leading him in some sort of routine that bore a perverse semblance to a waltz, it was actually a downright awful sign.

"Sirius-" Remus began, fully intending to complain. But then Sirius swept him out of the _Bugle _office and into the corridor, and 'round the corner, and soon he was spinning him dizzyingly, humming something rather tuneless, and then they had stopped, and Remus found himself leaning against a wall, slightly breathless, with Sirius still gripping his hands as though they would fall off otherwise. And Remus wasn't entirely sure what he'd just experienced, but all he knew was that as those hands held his own, a myriad thoughts which he was certain had never been there before were flitting in and out of his brain, forcing themselves upon him.

He stood there, panting, unable to take his eyes from Sirius's. He had gotten his wish... they were so close, and he could see them down to every little detail. Each eyelash stood out in relief, rising and falling rapidly as Sirius blinked.

And almost as soon as this pleasant emptiness had descended on Remus's mind, a low, drawling voice rang down the corridor: "Who's down there?"

Sirius sprung back from Remus immediately, startled by the voice around the corner. "Snivellus," he whispered. "What the fuck is he doing here?"

They looked at each other expectantly, each hoping the other would know what to do. All Remus knew was that Severus had to be stopped from getting to the _Bugle _office by any means possible.

"What are you doing down here?" he asked as he came within clear view of them.

"More's the question what are _you _doing down here?" Sirius snapped back.

Severus's gaze flitted between the two of them. "Nothing as suspicious as you two, no doubt."

"I was just looking for my key to the _Bugle _office," Remus said, thinking fast, "I lost it a while ago; I thought it might have dropped around here. I mean, McGonnagal's getting another one cut, but it wouldn't hurt to find the old one..."

Severus scoffed. "And what's _that _doing with you?"

"I resent being called '_that_'," Sirius said.

"Sirius is my friend," Remus said at the same time, "I see nothing wrong with him accompanying me in my search for the key to the _Bugle _office."

Severus said nothing, but merely raised an eyebrow. "I wouldn't be surprised if that's not what you're doing down here at all."

"But since you've got no proof, why don't you just bugger off?"

"Well-chosen words, Black," Severus said snidely. "Since I've got no proof... no proof of _what_?"

"Of whatever you want to think we were doing down here," Sirius said, smartly covering up for his minor slip.

"Which was, by the way, looking for my lost key," Remus said.

"I don't _want to _think about what you two perverts were doing," Severus said, turning around and heading straight back where he came from.

"That was weird," Sirius said as soon as Severus had left. "What was that about?"

"I don't know," Remus said. He didn't care that Severus had nearly discovered what they were up to in the _Bugle _office, but his fleeting moment with Sirius had been cut short, and that made him _very _annoyed.

* * *

Well well, what did you think? Leave me a review and let me know; they're fantastic little things, they are! :)

- _Legs_

NEXT TIME IN _SEX, COMMUNISM AND OTHER SUBVERSIVE ACTIVITIES_: The Marauders discover that being infamous is not all it's cracked up to be... it's a damn sight better!


	4. Reactions

Hello all! Sorry for such a long wait... I've been riding a trough in my creativity. But towards the end I picked up momentum, and so I'm pretty pleased with this chapter. Most other chapters stand alone in a somewhat episodic manner, but this one will flow really well into the next. Which I haven't written yet. But it will, trust me.

So thanks to everyone who's still going with this; I hope you enjoy chapter 4!

**Disclaimer**: Harry Potter is not mine, evidently. The SLASH is.

* * *

4. Reactions

It was five in the morning and Remus hadn't even considered getting up for school yet. It was, essentially, still dark, and he was sure his parents were fast asleep in their room down the hall. The bookshop only opened at eight on a weekday, after all. Since they lived above it, they didn't really have to get up until seven at the earliest. In fact, Remus was quite certain that the _whole of Hogsmeade _was still asleep.

Which really begged the question: why had someone just thrown a stone at his window?

He was quite warm in his bed, thank you very much, and did not particularly want to get up to see who the nuisance could be at this ungodly hour. Although he very much had an idea.

There was another tap. If they kept this up, soon the whole neighbourhood would be awake and cursing.

"Alright, alright," Remus mumbled to himself, "keep your hair on."

Sure enough, when he opened the window he saw Sirius sitting comfortably on a branch of the oak tree behind the shop. It had not been stones he was throwing, but acorns. And how dare he look so awake and alert at five in the morning; how dare he just sit there in the tree like he didn't belong anywhere else?

"Remus!" Sirius said animatedly. "We've done it!"

"Wha- what have we done?" Remus asked, rubbing his hand across his eyes.

"Not you, stupid. James and I. We've only just finished going around town and putting our leaflets in letterboxes!"

Remus forced a smile. It _was_very exciting, of course, but it was _five in the morning_.

"Can I come in?" Sirius asked. Before Remus could say "_it's five in the morning_", Sirius was swinging his legs over the edge of his branch and launching himself through Remus's window, nearly knocking Remus over.

"What do you want?" Remus asked, shutting the window as Sirius made himself at home on his bed.

Sirius rolled his eyes. "What do I want? Can't a guy visit his best friend?"

"Well, yes," Remus said, "that would be James for you. Why can't you go swinging through _his _window at five in the morning?"

"I did, once," Sirius said with a shudder, "and he tried to get friendly with me, if you know what I mean. He'd been dreaming and he thought I was Evans. So I'm never doing _that _again. Anyway, you're my best friend too. So it stands to reason that I can visit you when and where I like."

"I can think of several times and places where you most certainly cannot visit me."

"If you're thinking of the bathroom, don't forget that I saw your chap when we were camped out at the Shack that time. We all did."

Remus blushed. "It's not my fault _someone _took all the towels out of the bathroom so that they could build a fort in the kitchen. While I was showering."

Sirius laughed. Remus glared at him. "Could you not? I'd rather you didn't wake my parents."

"Whatever you say," Sirius said.

"So is there any other reason you came here?" Remus asked as he sat sown next to Sirius on his bed, half-hoping there was a reason, half-hoping there wasn't at all.

"Well, to celebrate, mainly," Sirius said.

Remus nodded sarcastically. "At _five in the morning_?"

"Essentially," Sirius confirmed with a nod.

"You never cease to baffle me," Remus said.

"Good," Sirius said, "I like the idea of being baffling."

They sat there for a few moments in silence. Sirius was fiddling with his hair, twirling one particularly long strand around his finger in an almost-feminine manner, which Remus supposed was why he found it so attractive. He subconsciously copied the movement, but he didn't exactly have enough hair to twirl - his conservative cut came down just below his ears, no further. Sirius, meanwhile, had commandeered all pairs of scissors in his house and hidden them beneath his bed. He'd also bribed the local barber, Peter's father, not to cut his hair whenever his mother took him there and forced him through the door.

"James put a little something extra in Evans's letterbox," Sirius said.

"What do you mean by that?"

"A romantic poem or some nonsense. He's asked her out on another date. Whether she says yes or not..."

"I wish he'd stop pestering her," Remus said. "He needs to take it more slowly."

Sirius laughed. "Oh yeah? And how would _you _go about winning a fair maiden's heart?"

"I don't have to, remember," Remus sniped, "I'm married to you or something like that."

"That's right," Sirius said with a fond smile. "But say you _weren't _married to me. How would _you _get into her pants?"

"I wouldn't _want _to get into her pants," he said without thinking. If he _had _thought, he probably wouldn't have said something with such homosexual connotations.

"Yeah, but say you _did _want to get into her pants. I want a different perspective, and you're the only one of us that Evans actually _talks _to. James sends flowers and shit poetry, I grab and kiss, and you... ?"

Remus thought for a moment. "To whom Evans actually talks. And I'd befriend her first, as I have done. There's no point in wooing someone with whom you aren't friends."

"Hold on, hold on," Sirius said, "all this crap with correcting my grammar is just a ruse, isn't it?"

"What are you on about?"

"Well, you said it yourself! You befriended Evans. You _must _want to get into her pants! Which is why you're denying it!"

"I do _not _want to get into her pants," Remus said.

"Methinks the lady doth protest too much!" Sirius riposted, and Remus had to shove a hand over his mouth to shut him up.

"My parents are asleep," he hissed, "and I'd like to keep it that way."

"Do _you _want to go to sleep?" Sirius asked, suddenly and bafflingly changing the topic.

"Now that you mention it..."

Not needing to be told twice, Sirius flopped backwards and reclined on Remus's bed.

"I thought you asked if _I _wanted to sleep," Remus said.

"You can sleep next to me," Sirius said, patting the space - just enough for a thin body - next to him.

Remus was blushing furiously, and desperately hoped that his room was dark enough for Sirius not to notice.

"Oh, come on," Sirius said, "I'm not James, I'm not going to try to touch you because I think you're someone else I've been dreaming about."

When Remus still didn't do anything, Sirius grabbed him by the back of his shirt and pulled him down so that they were lying side by side. Remus was _seriously _hoping that Sirius wouldn't glance in the direction of his pants, because they were growing tighter by the second.

"See? Nothing's happened yet," Sirius said.

Remus made a noise of assent.

Sirius was asleep within minutes - and fair enough too; he'd been up all night by the sounds of it - but Remus stayed awake until his alarm clock went off at seven. The buzzing jerked Sirius to attention, and he sat bolt upright.

"JESUS CHRIST WHAT IS THAT NOISE?" he shrieked. "REMUS, WHAT ARE YOU DOING IN MY BED?"

"SHUT THE HELL UP!" Remus said, pushing Sirius back down flat onto the bed, more to quieten him than anything. "This is MY bed!"

"Oh," Sirius said softly. "Sorry. I could have sworn that... oh. Never mind."

Remus cocked an eyebrow. "I don't think I _want _to know. Damn, you will have woken my parents. What am I going to tell them?"

"Tell them you woke up and found me lying here. Or something."

"Yeah, they'll sure warm to that one..."

Sirius laughed, and Remus suddenly remembered why he hated and loved that laugh so much, and why he had wanted to get out of there. It was _awful_.

"Just get off my bed, please."

"Alright, alright," Sirius said, looking amused and climbing off the bed to slouch on the floor.

A few seconds later, there was a knock on the bedroom door. "Remus?" his father asked. "Everything alright in there?"

"It's all under control, father. Sirius just dropped in for an early morning chat."

"Oh," came Mr. Lupin's voice from the corridor. "Alright, then. Don't be late for school, boys."

"We won't," Remus and Sirius replied.

"Good," he said, and his footsteps rang out along the corridor as he headed back to his bedroom.

They exchanged a naughty-schoolboy glance. "For once," Sirius said, "I can't wait to get to school. I just want to hear everyone talking about our leaflets..."

"That's what I meant to ask," Remus said, "how did you do it without getting noticed? I mean, did anyone pick up that it was you two?"

"I don't think so," Sirius said. "We had balaclavas. James took them home with him, because his parents don't ask questions."

"Balaclavas! Honestly!" Remus said, more to himself than to Sirius. "Come on," he added, "you'd better head off home so you can get to school in time."

"Do I _have _to?" Sirius whined.

"Yes," Remus said sternly.

"Fine," Sirius said, sounding for all the world like an infant who had just been refused candy and was trying their own juvenile form of reverse psychology. When Remus did nothing else but look at him disapprovingly, Sirius said "fine" again and climbed out the window, jumping into the oak.

"See you at school!" he offered as a final farewell, and skittered down the tree, landing with an inelegant thud on the ground, before running off in the direction of his home.

Remus laughed slightly to himself as he got ready for school.

When he arrived at around eight, James, Sirius and Peter were already sitting in the usual spot, acting about as innocently as they could ever manage.

"Good morning," Remus greeted.

"You bet it is!" James said. "_Everyone _is talking about the Marauders!"

"Well," Peter said quietly, "we heard Snivellus whining to Parkinson about the leaflet, and Parkinson said he never checks his mailbox."

"Shut up," James said offhandedly, "everyone _will _be talking about the Marauders by the end of the day, mark my words."

"Of course," Sirius said confidently, "because we, my men, are geniuses! No question about it."

Peter nodded solemnly. James and Sirius nodded proudly. Remus rolled his eyes.

But of all those who recognised their genius, and all those who despised the leaflets, there was one critic that James Potter feared more than any of them - and she was tall, had long read hair, and was heading towards them with a steely gaze in place right that very moment.

"Potter!" Lily snapped, standing with one hand on her hip and the other thrust forward, clutching a_ Red, White and Bluelist_. "Explain this," she said.

"Oh, yeah," James said in what was no doubt a rehearsed act of ignorance, "I got one of those too!"

And he wasn't lying. James and Sirius had made sure to leave no letterbox in central Hogsmeade un-leafleted, so the blame would have nowhere to be cast.

"Uh huh," Lily said, "so that no-one would suspect you of being the perpetrator. Or, one of them."

As James continued feigning ignorance, Sirius said "you know, Evans, sometimes you remind me a bit of Miss McGonnagal..."

"I bet _you _were in on this too, Black! It would _not _surprise me. And Pettigrew too."

Peter blushed slightly, partly because Lily knew his name, and partly because she was associating him with the Marauders.

"What about Comrade Lupinski?" Sirius joked. Remus shot him a glare - Lily didn't actually know that he was Russian, as far as he was aware, but then again he wouldn't put it past her.

Lily laughed. "Remus would get himself into this sort of thing. No, no, this has the terrible trio stamped all over it."

"Christ, Lily," Sirius said, throwing aside all pretence, "who d'you think came up with the idea of a blacklist?"

James slapped his hand onto his forehead comically. "And how else would we have been able to print them without a key to the print room?"

"Yeah, and who could have come up with such a snappy name for the lists?" Peter added.

And Remus realised just how instrumental he had been in the whole affair, and blushed slightly.

Lily's eyes widened.

"Look," Remus began, "I don't usually like to bend the rules in such a manner-"

"Fantastic!" she said.

"What?" James cried. "B- but! It was my idea! The whole subversive organisation thing, and the distribution of literature! Those were _my _ideas!"

Lily scoffed. "A subversive organisation? More like a bunch of silly teenage boys getting themselves in too deep! But if Remus really _did _come up with some of this stuff..."

"It was nothing," Remus mumbled.

"Now, now, don't be so modest!" Lily teased. "You've always been the smart one! Hey, you wouldn't be doing anything tonight, would you?"

"I don't believe this!" James cried. "We're going _steady_! Aren't we? And you're asking one of my best friends out _right in front of me_!"

Lily laughed. "Going steady my ass; we went on _one date_."

Sirius snickered.

"So how about it, Remus? You, me, tonight?"

Remus sat there with his mouth hanging slightly open, unable to believe that he - _he_! - was actually being asked out on a date! James was close to bursting, and Sirius and Peter didn't look too pleased either. It took a moment for him to bring himself to speak.

"I'm sorry, Lily, but I'm busy tonight."

"Damn right you are!" Sirius said suddenly. "You're coming to mine for dinner, remember?"

"Y- yeah," Remus said, thankful for Sirius saving his sorry (and possibly maybe not into women that way) behind.

James relaxed immeasurably.

Lily seemed to pick up that Remus was not at all pleased about the idea of a date, so she let it slide. She wouldn't have gotten much further, anyway, as the bell for their first class rang out across the grounds.

"Sport!" James said brightly. "C'mon, Petey!"

Peter groaned, but not wanting to be left behind he rushed off after the much more athletic James.

"Well, off to biology for me. What have you two got?" Lily asked Sirius and Remus.

"I have French, and Remus has chemistry," Sirius answered.

"How do you know that?" Remus asked, bemused.

"Memorised your timetable," Sirius said with a shrug, heading off in the direction of the French room, leaving Lily and Remus behind.

"How does he _do _that?" Remus said, staring after Sirius's retreating figure. "_I've _barely memorised my timetable!"

"That boy works in mysterious ways," Lily said. They set off for the Hogwarts Science Block together. "By the way, you're not _really _going to his place for dinner tonight, are you?"

"No," Remus admitted sheepishly.

"I guessed as much," she said. "I shouldn't have asked you out like that. I just wanted to rile James a bit."

"Mission accomplished."

They laughed.

"Are you ever going to go out with him again?" Remus asked as they reached the chemistry lab. "You know it would mean the world to him."

Lily blushed. "I don't know," she admitted. "Our first date _was _kinda fun..."

Remus smiled. Somehow, he thought, James _would _get that second date for which he was dying. He waved farewell to Lily and took up his usual lab bench: front row, left corner. Just his luck - sitting directly behind him was none other than Severus Snape.

"Lupin," Severus sneered, "I don't suppose _you _know anything about these leaflets that all our letterboxes woke up to this morning?"

Remus turned around reluctantly. "My parents were looking at it over breakfast... I didn't really get a close look."

"Oh, yes, your parents _would _be looking at it, wouldn't they?" he said pointedly.

"I don't know what you're talking about," Remus said blandly.

"Come off it, Lupin, we all know what sort of things you and your parents had in that dirty little shop of yours before the war."

Remus raised an eyebrow and turned back around, staring fixedly at the blackboard as Mr. Slughorn entered the room.

When he left to go to his next class, he found the words "COMMIE BASTARD" scrawled messily on his briefcase in chalk. He couldn't even be bothered wondering when and how they had found their way there. He skipped most of sport to wash them off in the boys' locker rooms.

The last period of the day was History, and the only class he shared with Sirius. Remus would have been sitting right up the front, but Sirius was more a back-row kind of fellow, so they compromised and sat near the middle. The lesson passed slowly - it was steaming with excess heat in the cramped classroom, and their teacher Mr. Binns was so relentlessly monotonous that he could talk his way out of prison simply by boring the guards to death. The upside to this was that he hardly noticed what was going on in his classroom, and so misbehaviour was rife.

Sirius was drawing a caricature of Binns "boring" a hole through a brick wall in both senses of the word, and Remus was taking lazy notes, punctuated by his staring into space. And during these episodes of staring, Remus was pondering his strange and bothersome attraction to the would-be cartoonist sitting next to him and radiating the heat of the classroom onto Remus. Or perhaps his heart was just fluttering more than usual. Sirius was _so_handsome when his face was scrunched up in concentration, staring at his latest drawing.

Remus scolded himself for thinking that, and turned his full attention back to Binns and the French Revolution.

But after a few moments he found his mind wandering. "Let them eat cake" was such a silly comment... almost like something that Sirius would say. And Sirius _did _say the strangest things. Like having memorised Remus's timetable. He probably hadn't. But if he had... and he had gone to all that trouble...

Remus was snapped out of his destructive daydreaming by the bell ringing, and the frantic scraping of chairs and flow of bodies draining out of the classroom door. Sirius lingered behind as Remus packed his things up.

"Now," Sirius began, "I'm going to find Snivellus and beat the living shit out of him for what he did to your case."

"Is that necessary?"

"Always. Oh, and you should go home."

Remus rolled his eyes. "I usually do after school. You know, what with having homework to do..."

"No, no," Sirius said, "you should go home but be at mine around six-fifteen."

"... why?"

"For dinner, of course," Sirius said with a smile. And patting a dumbstruck Remus on the shoulder, he flung himself dramatically out of the classroom and out of sight.

"Is everything alright, Remus?" Mr. Binns asked from the front of the classroom as he piled his books into a little battered briefcase. "Why haven't you gone home yet?"

"I'm just off now," Remus said, and stumbled out of the room in a daze.

Apparently, he _was _busy that night.

* * *

So what did you think? Liked it, loved it or loathed it? Leave a review, tell me, do.

- _Legs_

NEXT TIME IN _SEX, COMMUNISM AND OTHER SUBVERSIVE ACTIVITIES_: Dinner at the Black Mansion.


	5. Date

Well would you look at this... it's chapter 5! Hope you've all been on tenterhooks to see how Remus's dinner at the Black table would go... well, here it is! HUGE thanks to everyone who left a review - your words mean the world to me. I hope you all enjoy this chapter.

**Disclaimer**: Seeing as the word "sex" is in the title, it's safe to assume that this ISN'T Harry Potter, but a work of fan fiction.

* * *

5. Date

When Remus got home from school, he was still in something of a daze. James was always going on about how he was going to ask Lily 'round to his for dinner one day, so his parents could meet his future wife. Remus knew it was silly, but he couldn't shake the wholly unsuitable feelings that the promise of dinner at Sirius's house conjured.

He found himself staring into the mirror in his bedroom, telling himself that Sirius could never be sweet on anyone so scrawny, pale and generally-not-female. But in the corner of his eye, he could see his bed behind him, where Sirius had slept next to him that morning, and the completely unreasonable feelings began to rear their ugly heads.

Remus had previously brushed these thoughts away, and was most definitely not letting them overtake his mind.

But there they were. And it was getting harder and harder to deny it to himself: he fancied Sirius in the way that most men fancy girls with large breasts and pretty smiles.

Not that Remus had anything against large breasts and pretty smiles. They were great. But the more he thought about it, the more he knew that they just weren't for him. Why would he need a pretty smile when he could see that wicked smile that emerged on Sirius's lips when he had an idea? And what were large breasts compared to Sirius's generally handsome body?

It had taken Sirius asking him 'round for dinner to make him realise it, but as he stood staring into his mirror, Remus firmly concluded that he was utterly, completely and irrevocably in love with Sirius Black.

And he couldn't decide whether that was a good thing or not. But if these feelings were here to stay, then there was no point in trying to push them away, _that_ he now knew for sure.

Eyeing the scrawny, pale and generally-not-female boy staring at him in the mirror, he reasoned that if he _was_ to be the guest of honour at the Black table that evening, he might as well make himself presentable. A good fitted coat would deal with the scrawny. A bit of his mother's rouge, applied discreetly, would deal with the pale. Although it mightn't do much for the generally-not-female. Maybe not the rouge, then.

But if he found Sirius so attractive, then he was damned if he wasn't going to make Sirius find him attractive too.

In a rush of emotions, Remus flung his closet doors open with all the strength his skinny arms contained and began rifling through his meagre supply of clothing. He only had a few items he would even _consider_ wearing to the Black household, where well-kept was not good enough, and within moments they were lying spread out across his bed.

Remus wondered for a moment why he was thinking so much about his appearance. After all, he'd been to Sirius's house before, if only briefly or when his parents were out, and he'd met his parents in passing. But he'd never been there for dinner. Or with a very large crush on Sirius. That was bad. That was _very _bad. The urge to look good for Sirius was such a _female_ thing to think. Heaven knows half of the girls at Hogwarts probably had that urge. So surely it wasn't _that_ bad that Remus had it too?

What _was_ bad was that Sirius would undoubtedly prefer any girl who made the effort to look good for him to, well, one of his best friends making the effort to look good for him.

Remus slumped down on his bed, amidst the scattered clothing. It was a no-hoper. He might as well just give up. He would just have to learn to live with this unrequited love that had sprung itself upon him so quickly. Perhaps it could spring away from him just as quickly?

There had been occasions in Remus's life where he had contemplated giving up on something he wanted. Most people experience moments like that. But sometimes, just when you think it's a lost cause, something happens that restores a little bit of faith in your wishful thinking. It can almost seem too good to be true.

So just when Remus was beginning to despise his feelings just that little bit more than usual, there was the ringing of a telephone from the corridor outside his room. He reasoned that he might as well answer. It might take his mind off his predicament.

"Remus Lupin speaking," he said, picking up the mouthpiece.

"REMUS LUPIN!" came a cry from the earpiece. Remus moved it slightly away from his ear. "Just the person I was hoping to talk to," Sirius said, still speaking far too loudly.

"To whom you were hoping to talk," Remus corrected. "Do continue."

"You're still coming for dinner, yes? Even after what I did to Snivellus?"

"What _did_ you do to him?"

"Let's just say he'll have a hard time explaining what happened to his schoolbag. But hey, this is not what I wanted to talk about."

"Oh yes?"

"Yeah, I just got a call from James. Turns out Evans _did_ get that message he left for her – she did a pretty good job of not letting on, though. Anyway, long story short, she agreed to go out with him again. Tonight."

"That's wonderful," Remus said with a smile, "I'm so glad for James."

"Yes, well, here's the problem. He wants me to go with him. Apparently Evans didn't want it to be a proper 'date'."

"So dinner's off, then?"

"Heavens, no!" Sirius said, sounding appalled. "No, no, no. They're going to the pictures, and then having a late dinner after. It's the late dinner that I've been invited along to."

"To which you've been..." Remus began, but then realised that "along" is also a preposition, and stopped himself before he became even more confused. Of course, if simply speaking to Sirius about dating wasn't tying his tongue in knots, he would have said "to which you've been invited", easily. At any rate, Sirius began to talk over him.

"But here's the deal – James asked me to bring someone. So what d'you reckon? Up for a late night sojourn into the real world?"

Remus was torn between rolling his eyes and wetting his pants in excitement. A _date_ – Sirius had just asked him out on a_ date_. Surely not.

"Sirius," he said, "I'm pretty sure that when James asked you to 'bring someone', he meant a_ date_. I think he's got in mind a... what a do you call it... a double date."

"Oh," Sirius said, evidently a little bit let down by that idea. But he soon snapped out of it. "Oh well, you can come anyway. If James is really offended, I can put you in a wig and a skirt and no-one will be any the wiser."

"Right, that clears _that_ up," Remus said, an edge of sarcasm in his voice.

"Oh, and by the way," Sirius said, "when I said 'a late dinner', I meant about seven thirty. So maybe you should just get to my house now, and we can eat early."

"How long does dinner _take_?"

"There's grace to be said, and several courses to be had. It's not pleasant."

Remus could almost hear Sirius flinch over the phone.

"And anyway," he continued, "the earlier you get here, the longer I get to spend with you."

Remus blushed, grateful that Sirius couldn't see him. If Sirius was so keen on spending time with him, then surely getting a little dressed up wouldn't do him any harm? Surely having a _few_ feelings for Sirius wouldn't hurt? Surely he could make it through one night?

Besides, they were practically _going on a date_.

Remus took that as his cue to make his excuses, and go and choose some goddamn clothes.

He was at the Black Mansion at a quarter to six, which probably wasn't as early as Sirius had wanted him to appear, but could he help it if he was busy choosing an outfit? They were going out afterwards, for heaven's sakes!

"You look spiffing," Sirius greeted as he flung the door open. "Dressed to impress, I see. You _sure_ you don't secretly fancy Evans?"

"Quite sure," Remus said. And he honestly was.

"Right, then," Sirius said with a wide grin, "come on in."

"Sirius," a female voice rang out almost as soon as Remus was inside, "is that your friend?"

"Yes, mother," Sirius called, rolling his eyes as he led Remus up the staircase.

There was no further reply.

"You've seen my bedroom, haven't you?" Sirius asked.

"I have indeed," Remus confirmed.

"You'll know, then," Sirius said, "that it's a pretty fun place. _Much_ better than yours."

Just then, an unassuming door to the right opened a crack, and a faced peered out. Remus recognised this as belong to Sirius's younger brother Regulus, who he never really saw much. Regulus looked almost like a miniature Sirius – he was a few inches shorter, and a lot less elegant. And Remus didn't find him remotely attractive, which was the main point of difference. Obviously.

"Please try not to make too much noise," Regulus said, running a hand through his hair. "Some of us have homework we're working on."

So the improper use of prepositions ran in the family, then.

Sirius laughed loudly. "Homework? Nonsense, Regulus, that isn't of any import in this modern world. It's _who_ you know, not _what_ you know!"

Regulus scowled and shut his door with a bang that surely could not be conducive to doing any homework.

"Little shit," Sirius mumbled, "he loves having a good piss on my parade."

"Sirius! He's your _brother_!"

"You don't have to like your family," Sirius said, an uncharacteristically harsh edge to his voice. "Anyway, this here is my room!"

The door to which Sirius was gesturing had some tape across it reading "POLICE LINE – DO NOT CROSS", which couldn't have been obtained legally. Beneath it was a neatly-written cardboard sign, stating that "Those who dare enter the inner sanctum of Mr. S. C. Black, Esq., do so at their own risk and should understand that any consequence of their entry is entirely their own fault". None of this had been there the last time Remus had.

"Don't worry," Sirius said with a small smile, "it doesn't count if you're invited in." He unlocked and held out the door. "After you."

Remus hesitantly stepped inside the room, without any of the readiness with which Sirius had entered his that morning. Somehow, this time being inside Sirius's room had more meaning than the last few times.

Despite the foreboding warnings on the door, Sirius's bedroom was relatively normal. Well, if you counted being made of lots and lots of money normal. In the centre of the room sat a four-poster bed that looked as though sleeping was the _last_ thing for which it would ever be used. There were too many pillows, for a start – perhaps all the pillows in the house, appropriated for Sirius's private use – and if that weren't enough, there were schoolbooks, sketchbooks, pens and pencils strewn over the bedclothes. The walls were plastered not with pin-ups, as you'd expect of a teenage boy such as Sirius, but drawings he'd done himself on some occasion or other. There was even the original design for the _Red, White and Bluelist_ picture. The floor was covered in clothing that should have been put away long ago, and his desk, rather than being used for work, was clearly used entirely for storage.

"It's less tidy than usual," Remus observed.

"It's not tidy at the best of times," Sirius said with a laugh. "So it must be _really_ bad now."

"It really is," Remus said.

Sirius shrugged. "All it means, really, is that my parents will try and get the maid to clean it. Although I think I stole her copy of the key."

"Charming, you are," Remus said sarcastically.

"And renowned for it."

Unlike the last time that Remus had been in this room, they did not flick through pin-up magazines. Instead, they began to discuss the next wave of Marauder action. Of course, nothing could be solidly decided without James and Peter, but, as Sirius put it, they were "the brains behind the whole thing".

At around six, they were called downstairs for dinner by Regulus knocking on the door, saying that if they didn't come down soon, mummy would have them both castrated so that they would stop looking at those stupid magazine women. Sirius scoffed at that. "I barely look at those lovely ladies with the large knockers and toothy smiles. It's more of a social habit. Much like alcohol."

By this point, Remus was fairly sure that the only thing Sirius could ever do to make him fall out of love with him was to cease existing. Or betray the Marauders. That would be pretty unlovable. But it would also be very un-Sirius.

Dinner with the Blacks was much as Sirius had described it – grace to be said, several courses to be eaten and not a lot else. It was also tense and unpleasant. Clearly the Blacks disapproved of the heir to their fortune associating with such types as Remus. For some reason, a wealthy person being in a friendship with a fairly poor person was not considered proper. Then again, at least as far as the Blacks were concerned, there was no risk of Sirius running off and marrying Remus, further besmirching the family name.

Remus sat awkwardly beside Sirius – which was still a fair distance away. The dining table was big enough to have a ball hosted on it. It was long and rectangular, and Sirius's parents sat at either end, with Regulus sitting across from Sirius and Remus. There was no conversation over dinner, and this rather annoyed Remus. At his house, dinners often ran longer than they probably should have, because no-one bothered to clean the table while there was a political or philosophical conversation in full swing.

Eventually, however, the meal came to a close, at which point Sirius grabbed Remus by the wrist and dragged him off to his bedroom so he could change into something more appropriate for a night on the town. He pulled on informal slacks and slipped off his tie, leaving his shirt buttoned enough to stay respectable, but still unbuttoned enough to add a general air of "sexy" to his appearance.

They left through the bedroom window.

It was a short walk from the Black mansion to the central district of Hogsmeade, and apparently Sirius had agreed to meet James and Lily outside the cinema. They were there at seven-thirty, and soon after the aforementioned couple exited, not standing too close to each other, but not looking too embarrassed to be in their present company either.

"Sirius!" James called out gleefully, looking almost glad of the distraction. "I see you... uh... I see you 'brought someone'..."

"I tried to tell him," Remus said with a sigh. "He wasn't having any of it."

"I bet he wasn't," James said, glaring briefly at Sirius. It might just have been the light, but it looked to Remus like Sirius's cheeks almost flushed at that glare.

"Remus! What a lovely surprise!" Lily said, giving Remus a quick hug. "You're looking positively dashing this evening. Out to impress some ladies, eh?"

Remus couldn't help be reminded of how Sirius had greeted him earlier that evening as he shook his head. "No, no... no ladies for me tonight."

"Damn right," Sirius said, slipping an arm casually around Remus's shoulder. "You're a married man, Lupinski!"

"Since when?" James asked, amused.

"It's a long story," Sirius said, as Remus was currently incapable of speech, "involving a weekend in Las Vegas that you weren't invited to."

"To which you weren't invited," Remus said, finally regaining his neural functionality and shrugging Sirius's arm off himself.

"I don't want to know," James said with a laugh.

"Shall we get something to eat, boys?" Lily asked.

"We've already eaten," Sirius admitted, "but some decent dessert would be nice."

"Oh, come on," Remus said as they started to walk off, "that cake was heavenly!"

"Yes, but it was made through slave labour. As soon as I don't have to live off my parents, I'll be cooking my _own_ meals, thank you very much."

"You're a bigger Bolsh that I took you for," James said with a laugh.

"So you actually went to Sirius's for dinner?" Lily said, grinning. "I thought that was just an excuse to avoid my company."

"And yet here I am," Remus pointed out.

Soon they came to the local teenage haunt, the Leaky Cup, which despite its name had very sanitary premises and few leaky cups. As James and Sirius went to order at the counter, Remus and Lily chose a table near the back, and sat down across from each other.

"So how's your date been so far?" he asked.

"Surprisingly pleasant," Lily said with a fond smile. "James is a nice guy when he doesn't think too hard about it."

"This is true," Remus said.

James and Sirius joined them at the table, Sirius seating himself next to Remus and James next to Lily. "Tom's got a new waitress," Sirius said, eyes glinting. "She's a real looker."

James nodded, before adding "but I've only got eyes for you, Lily."

Sirius nudged Remus. "See, the one over there with the brown hair."

Remus followed the path of Sirius's eyes. The waitress in question had mousy hair tied up in a loose bun above her head, and she was pale and curvy, with the obligatory massive breasts. In fact, she looked a lot like what Remus's mother had looked like in her youth.

"Thank you but no thank you," Remus said, "I don't go for girls who look like my mother."

"Oh shit!" James said. "You're right! You know that photo in your dining room of your mom when she was twenty or something? She looks like that!"

Lily giggled. "No wonder you're such a handsome young man, Remus. Seems it runs in the family!"

James glared at her. "What?" she said. "I'm allowed to think he's handsome! It's not like I'm dating you or anything."

"Will you?" James asked.

There was a silence, and Remus and Sirius exchanged nervous glances. This was not exactly a conversation to which they wanted to be privy.

"I tell you what," Lily said in a whisper after a pause, "if your next bit of subversive literature is impressive enough, I will."

James broke out into a massive grin. "That's manageable. That's _easy_! We can do this, can't we boys?"

Sirius and Remus nodded eagerly, not wanting to be partially responsible for their friend's potential heartbreak.

"Consider it a challenge," Lily said, clearly enjoying this position of power she suddenly held.

"Challenge accepted," James said. "Prepare to be blown away."

* * *

Well, what did you think? Leave a review, Comrades, and you will doubtless get a reply, for all reviews are equal in the magical land of Legstopia! Okay, okay, I'll stop being gratuitously silly. But you get the idea. REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW! :D

**A/N**: I really loved writing this chapter... there was so much I could do with the sexual tension here. And, as with all my good-to-bloody brilliant ideas, the idea of the "double date" came to me pretty much as I wrote it. I get the feeling things are about to get interesting, don't you?

- _Legs_

NEXT TIME IN _SEX, COMMUNISM AND OTHER SUBVERSIVE ACTIVITIES_: The Marauders start plotting their second wave of attacks, and Sirius Black shows off his many talents yet again.


	6. Diversions

So I know I said I'd update _Between Love and Hate_ and this fic alternately, but I just HAD to write this chapter. Trust me, you'll love it.

As usual, muchas gratias to everyone who's reviewed. Your reviews mean a lot to me, I hope you know that. (Also it wouldn't hurt to give _BLaH _a bit more review love. Just sayin'.)

**Disclaimer**: By now I'm sure you've realised that I OWN NOTHING! You are all intelligent people.

* * *

6. Diversions

"Why wasn't _I_ invited?" Peter whined for perhaps the hundredth time that afternoon. The Marauders were at James's house, plotting the content of their next leaflet, and once it had been explained to Peter why this one had to be more impressive than the last, he was nothing but indignant at missing out on such an important development.

"I _told_ you," James said, "Lily asked me to ask Sirius, and then she asked me to ask Sirius to ask someone, and Sirius asked Remus."

"So why didn't Remus ask me?"

"Because Lily didn't ask me to ask Sirius to ask _two_ people, did she?" James said impatiently. "Anyway, it doesn't matter. Come on. We need an idea."

"We can't just do another blacklist, with a more impressive cartoon, can we?" Sirius asked.

"_No_," James said slowly, as if Sirius was an idiot, "because if it was only the _cartoon_ that was impressive, then _you'd_ get all the credit and Lily wouldn't go out with me!"

Sirius rolled his eyes. "Men are so pathetic when they're in love."

Remus privately agreed.

"Come on, we need _something_!" James said, ignoring Sirius.

"James, _you_ need to come up with it," Remus said, "otherwise if Lily likes it and agrees to go out with you, you'll still feel like it's a dishonest victory."

James nodded. "I agree. As ever, Comrade Josef speaks wise words."

"So? What's your idea?" Peter asked.

"Give me time!" James snapped.

Fifteen minutes later, James still had no ideas. And he was beginning to get desperate, scraping the bottom of his mental barrel.

"Christ," Sirius said, staring at the ceiling, "you've gotten that bloody song stuck in my head, Potter."

"Which one?" James asked.

"Bei Mir Bist Du whatsit," Sirius said in a whiny tone. "It's like a broken record."

"It is terribly catchy," Remus said.

There was a few seconds' pause, after which James suddenly shouted "CATCHY!"

"Catchy?" Peter asked, coming out of a vague trance.

"Catchy," James reiterated. "We can't just list names. We need something that will make us get stuck in people's heads, just like the song. A tagline! A really, really memorable tagline!"

"That can't be it, though," Remus said, "we'll need something other than just a tagline."

"We'll do the whole blacklist thing again," James continued, "maybe add a few more names to the mix. But with a tagline! It's perfect!"

"We _do_ have a tagline," Sirius said, picking up a copy of the last leaflet. "_Bringing you the latest news on suspected anti-Communists, un-un-Americans and violators of basic human rights_. Remember?"

"That's hardly a tagline," James said. "We need something like 'The Marauders: keeping Hogsmeade red since 1947'. Except better. AND I have to come up with it. Otherwise it would be a dishonest victory. Right, Remus?"

Remus nodded reluctantly, pushing away the variations to James's tagline that were popping into his mind.

James muttered to himself for the next five minutes, writing things down and crossing them out, and generally looking quite frustrated.

"Keeping the 'Hogs' out of Hogsmeade? Putting the mayhem back into Hogsmeade?"

Most of James's ideas were shot down quickly, at first with long-winded reasons why they just didn't work, and later with grunts and waves of a hand.

But as he is often wont to do, James's tagline came to him in a momentary flash of brilliance.

"The Marauders;" he began, as usual, "unafraid to say what you've been thinking."

"I quite like it," Remus said after a moment.

"Me too," Sirius said. "If Lily's looking for a brave man, nothing says brave like saying what other people are too afraid to say themselves."

"It's good," Peter added helpfully.

"It's settled, then!" James said gleefully. "Let's refine our blacklist, and maybe get a new cartoon, Sirius. Hopefully we can go to print tomorrow morning."

"Yes, I've been thinking about that," Sirius said. "Snivellus very nearly caught us last time. It was a close shave. How about this time, we print it in the afternoon? We can pull some sort of prank to distract attention away from the _Bugle_ office, - a diversion, if you like, - and make sure Snivellus is out of the way, and that way we can use the mimeo uninterrupted."

"Brilliant," Remus said, grinning. Maybe it was because it was Sirius's idea, maybe it was because he hadn't pulled a prank in quite a while, but he was rather unusually excited by this.

James, too, broke into a wide smile. "Right, then. Remus, you and Peter can go to the office, because it's less suspicious if you're down there, seeing as you're the Editor. And Peter, it's your turn to crank the mimeo."

Peter frowned. "Who says?"

"We're going reverse-alphabetical order. Potter first, then Pettigrew. It'll be Lupinski after that, then Black."

"That's hardly fair," Sirius said, "we all know that Remus has as much arm muscle as a zucchini."

"In a _proper_ Communist society, everyone has their turn," James said, glancing snidely at Sirius. That shut him up.

"Anyway, Sirius," James said, "that leaves the two of us to execute the diversion of the century."

"Smoke bombs?" Peter suggested. "That's always worked in the past – plus it's hardly traceable to us. Anyone could have dropped them."

Sirius shrugged. "Smoke bombs are so passé. It's been done – and not only by us, as you yourself made so clear, Peter."

"Oh well," Peter said. "What _are _you going to do, then?"

"This needs to be something unique to us, doesn't it?" Sirius asked James.

"Needs to be? Or do we just _want_ it to be?"

"Both," Sirius said firmly.

"I've got an idea," Remus said. "But it would involve the two of you humiliating yourselves in front of the whole school."

Sirius grinned. "Excellent. I do love a good spot of public humiliation."

"As do I," James said. "Tell us the plan, then, Comrade."

The next morning, the latest _Red, White and Bluelist_, complete with a new cartoon by Sirius, sat in James's bag ready to be copied in the afternoon. When he arrived at school, he found Lily sitting with Remus in their usual spot.

"I've just told Lily about this afternoon," Remus said.

"I don't want to know what you're up to," she said, "but Remus has told me it won't be a sight to be missed by any stretch of the imagination."

James smiled suavely. "That's right, it's going to be fantastic. Be sure to remind all your friends to come to the Great Hall this afternoon. And tell them to tell _their _friends. And so on."

"It _will_ be brilliant," Remus confirmed.

"Will you be participating?" Lily asked.

"Alas, I won't even be a spectator," Remus said, and he genuinely was sorry to be missing this diversion. "I'll be busy with much more important things."

"Oh!" Lily said, cottoning on. "So _that's_ why something massive is happening this afternoon! Because something _else_ is happening..."

"Exactly!" James said.

Just then, Sirius came leaping up to the three of them. "I've told everyone I've encountered so far – Great Hall, straight after school finishes."

"Great," James said. "This _will_ be spectacular."

That afternoon, the moment the bell rang, Sirius and James dashed out of class to the Great Hall, where the bulk of school assemblies were held. Remus and Peter ducked in quickly to make sure that Severus was there – and when they saw him lingering with some friends near the back of the crowd, they headed out and down to the _Bugle_ office.

The corridors near the office were deserted – all the teachers would be in their own offices or heading home, and it seemed as though word had spread sufficiently to have the entire student body in the Great Hall, eagerly awaiting the spectacle.

Remus unlocked the office, and Peter dashed in and immediately began running the _Red, White and Bluelist_ through the mimeo. Remus stood near the door, on full alert in case anyone came walking by.

Meanwhile, in the Hall, James and Sirius leapt up onto the raised platform that passed as a stage towards the front of the large open space. They had ensured that the microphone was switched on, and James began straight away, clearing his throat.

"Good afternoon, Hogwarts," he began, and there were a few groans in the audience. "You may wonder why Mister Black and myself have called you here today."

"It's simple, really," Sirius said. "We've been feeling a little bad lately – or rather remorseful, if you will, for some of our pranks."

"Specifically, some against a particular person, who we admire _so dearly_," James added.

"So without further ado," Sirius continued, "we wish to present our public apology to the one... the only... SEVERUS SNAPE!"

There were a fair few cheers in the audience, notably some of Lily's friends, who were even applauding. Lily was plainly trying not to smile.

And then they started singing.

Let's just say that two tone-deaf teenage boys blasting out "Bei Mir Bist Du Schoen" into a crackly microphone was not the most pleasant sound ever to fall on the ears of the students of Hogwarts.

Soon after they'd begun singing, Severus left the Hall. This had been Remus's plan all along - he would leave the Hall and get as far away from the school as he could to avoid the laughs of all the other students. When the show was over, everyone would go straight home, whilst down in the _Bugle_ office, the Marauders would be able to print in safety.

Peter was taking a break from his task when James and Sirius returned. "How did it go?" he asked.

"Exactly to plan," James said. "Snivellus ditched early and everyone left as soon as it was over."

"No teachers came in, which is a minor miracle," Sirius said.

"And Lily liked it," James added. "She was smiling. I hope she knew I was actually singing about her."

"I doubt it," Sirius said.

James frowned. "Peter," he said, "I don't hear cranking!"

Grumbling something about his arms being tired, Peter dragged himself back to the mimeo and began running off more leaflets.

"Oh, I forgot," Sirius said suddenly, reaching into his bag and rifling around for a bit, finally emerging with a piece of paper. "I drew this last night when I got back home. I want some opinions from you two."

He was gesturing to James and Peter.

"Why not me?" Remus asked, mildly confused.

"I showed you this morning, remember?" Sirius said. His back was turned to the other two, and he was giving Remus such a look that Remus thought it'd be best to go along with him.

"Oh, that's right," he said. "I do remember."

"Of course," Sirius said happily, his glare disappearing. "Christ, I need to take a leak. Feel like coming for a walk, Remus?"

"Uh, sure," Remus said, more and more confused by the second.

Sirius skipped out of the room, and Remus followed. They left behind James and Peter, giggling over Sirius's cartoon that it seemed Remus would not get to see.

"Sirius, what's going on? Remus asked in an unnecessary whisper as soon as they were out of earshot of the _Bugle_ office.

"I've been doing an awful lot of thinking lately," Sirius said.

"That doesn't tell me anything!" Remus said. "Why did you drag me away from the others? Why can't I see the cartoon?"

It seemed that in his bewilderment, Remus had forgotten his slightly massive crush on Sirius. Otherwise, he obviously wouldn't have minded being dragged away from the others.

"Call it a diversion," Sirius said.

"A diversion?" Remus asked, still baffled. "A diversion from _what_?"

Sirius was blushing, Remus noticed, with a most attractive shade of red spreading out from his cheeks.

"This," Sirius said, and it took Remus a moment to register that Sirius's hand had somehow snaked its way around his neck, and then their faces were drawing closer together, and their lips were touching. A jolt of electricity flew down Remus's spine like lightning as the other of Sirius's hands wrapped around his waist. Their lips pressed closer together, and Remus felt that he should be doing something other than just standing there passively, so he let his arms mimic the positions of Sirius's. He was obviously doing _something_ right, because Sirius leant further into the kiss and pulled them closer together. His mouth opened slightly, and Remus felt his tongue running its way along his own lips.

It was as though Remus was dreaming. Not that he'd ever dreamt about kissing Sirius before – daydreamt, perhaps – but he certainly would in the future.

Their mouths parted briefly for air, before clashing again together, this time with more passion than before. Remus didn't hesitate to open his mouth a bit and stick his tongue out. He'd never done this before, but it was as though his body instinctively knew what to do.

After a few moments, they stopped kissing and just stood there holding each other. _This_ was definitely something about which Remus had dreamt.

"Sorry," Sirius said. "Couldn't help myself. Don't think you minded, though."

"I didn't mind at all," Remus confirmed.

"Jolly good," Sirius said. "We should probably get back to the print room."

"Probably," Remus said. He wasn't sure how long they'd been there.

Reluctantly, they separated and walked back in the direction of the _Bugle_ office.

"Took your time in the bathroom!" James said as they entered through the door.

"Do you _want_ the details of my bowel movements?" Sirius asked, shooting James a wicked grin.

"Not at _all_," James said. "Anyway, Pete's done with the _'Lists_. Shall we head out tonight for distribution?"

"Too obvious," Remus said. "Not straight after the diversion. Give it a couple of days."

Frankly, he was surprised that he could think straight after Sirius's diversion.

Three days went by before James deemed it safe to distribute the leaflets, and three days went by without another word from Sirius about that kiss in the corridor. To say Remus was panicking a little would be an understatement. Occasionally he would wonder whether Sirius felt pretty much the same way that he did, but that was usually replaced by a desire to just goddamn kiss him again already.

On the morning after the leaflets had gone out, Remus purposely came to school a little later than usual. He had almost been hoping that Sirius would turn up in his bedroom that morning – but he was probably tired from a night of letterboxing. Fair enough.

He found James and Peter sitting with Lily, but no Sirius. James immediately ran up to him.

"Guess what?" James said, that look that can only mean trouble glowing in his eyes.

"What?" Remus asked.

"I've got a girlfriend!" James cried exuberantly. "Lily loved it! She _loved_ it! We're going out! Can you believe it?"

"I can," Remus said, smiling at James's victory. "Congratulations."

"Why thank you," James said, a permanent idiotic grin now plastered on his face.

"Have you seen Sirius this morning?" Remus asked as they walked over to Lily and Peter, trying to sound as casual as possible.

"Oh, he was here earlier," James said, "but he disappeared a while ago. Said he was going for a walk somewhere."

"That's right!" Peter said. "He said he was going to lock himself in the art room and not come out until he'd done something indecent."

"Drawn something, you mean," Lily said, a contented smile on her face.

"No, he definitely said 'done'," James agreed.

"Huh," Lily said, "that's odd."

"That's Sirius," James said. "Odd boy." He leant over Remus and whispered softly "probably having a wank."

Remus flushed red. Now that was a mental image he did _not_ need hanging over him for the rest of the day.

"Anyway, we should go get him," James said. "He hasn't heard my fantastic news yet!"

"I'll go and find him," Remus volunteered. And he'd be damned if he wasn't going to do something indecent when he did find him.

The art room was in corner of the school not far from the _Bugle_ office, a corner not frequently frequented by the Hogwarts students. And of course, it wasn't suspicious at all that Sirius was in the art room – after all, to him "class" meant "another opportunity to draw".

Remus opened the door to find Sirius lying on the floor drawing in the cover of his English book, but as soon as he closed it behind him Sirius looked up and a broad smile crossed his face.

"I've been expecting you," Sirius said, getting up off the floor. "Glad to see you got my little hint."

"Indeed," Remus said. "So I'm guessing that now we do something indecent."

Without responding, Sirius grabbed Remus by the wrist and pulled him away from the door. He backed him against the wall and proceeded to shove their lips together with such force as Remus had never even thought possible.

"I can't believe this is actually happening," Remus said after five good, solid minutes of nothing but kissing.

Sirius laughed. "You have no idea how fucking long I've wanted to get in your mouth for."

"For how fucking long you've wanted to get into my mouth," Remus corrected.

"That really gets me going," Sirius said, "when you correct my grammar."

"I take it it's not an incentive to improve, then?"

"Absolutely not."

"So I should just stop doing it, then," Remus joked.

"Never," Sirius said, plunging himself into Remus's half-open mouth without any warning.

It was so strange – just a few days ago Remus had been bemoaning the fact that Sirius would never reciprocate his stupidly girly feelings, and now they were kissing in the art room. He vaguely wondered when exactly Sirius had decided that he might like to involve himself in this sort of thing, and why, but then forced himself to stop. If he thought too much about it, it might not continue. Besides, Sirius's hand was entwining itself in his hair, and that didn't feel half bad.

All too soon, the bell rang for them to go to class. But Remus was left with the pleasant thought that whatever Sirius felt, whatever his intentions were, he'd made it clear that that indecent encounter most certainly _wouldn't_ be the last.

* * *

YES! FINALLY! HOW MUCH DO YOU LOVE ME? LOTS? Leave a review, why don't you? ;D

Hope you enjoyed... but it might be a while before Chapter 7 - exams start on Monday and I really need to work on _BLaH_.

Until next time,

- _Legs_

NEXT TIME IN _SEX, COMMUNISM AND OTHER SUBVERSIVE ACTIVITIES_: Remus is still confused. Sirius is still quite kissable. James is still lovesick. Peter is still somewhere in the background.


	7. Infamy

Yeah, it's been a while. I APOLOGISE! I've been busy with schoolwork. I've finished this chapter off quite quickly today because I'm stuck home with a cold. And it's the HOLIDAYS! So expect more... eventually. I have to finish the next chapter of _Between Love and Hate_ next.

Thanks to everyone who's still reading and enjoying this! I hope you like this chapter~

**Disclaimer**: Oh, look. FANfiction. Not mine.

* * *

7. Infamy

It soon became evident that Lily Evans hadn't been the only person upon whom the Marauders' second wave of _Red, White and Bluelists_ had made an impact. Not only were people actually talking about it at school, but it seemed that this time 'round the respectable members of the Hogsmeade community had gotten a word in about it.

Well, maybe that would be putting it mildly. The Mayor, Tom Riddle, had written a condemnation of the lists in the _Daily Prophet_, Hogsmeade's newspaper, with many others signing their names in approval of his sentiments. It was perhaps thought that if the _wealthy_ Hogsmeadians declaimed the lists as libel, then _everyone_ should believe just so.

This was clearly not the case, as Remus's parents proved one morning over breakfast.

"I think it's rather clever, don't you?" his mother said. "These 'Marauder' people sure have an imagination."

Remus focused in on his toast. _Don't react_.

"I love it," his father said, "absolutely love it. It's about time some people said what everyone's been thinking."

Well, obviously the tagline worked.

"You know what _I_ think?" his mother said. "_I_ think that it's just the kind of thing Remus and his friends would get up to."

Remus blushed and kept thinking about toast. _Toast toast toast. Toast._

"So do _I_," his father said pointedly.

It took Remus a second or so to register that they were both looking at him expectantly. Toast wasn't going to get him out of this one.

"Uh..."

"It is you lot, isn't it?" his father asked. "You and that clever Potter boy, and probably Pettigrew too. Not sure his father would approve of it, but there you go."

"Don't forget dear Sirius," his mother said. "Lovely boy, but Walburga and Orion would be _beastly_ to have as parents. I don't like them _at all_."

Remus suppressed a laugh. "Is it that obvious?" he asked.

"Only to us, dear," his mother said, putting a comforting hand on the arm that he had been _trying_ to use to spread jam on his toast.

"I'm so proud of you, son," his father said. "This is the sort of thing we Lupins are made for."

"For which we Lupins are made," Remus corrected, and with his mother having taken her hand off his arm, he proceeded to spread some raspberry jam on his toast.

"I don't know where he gets _that_ from," his mother said, sharing a pained look with her husband.

Just then, the doorbell rang down below in the bookstore.

"From where he gets that," Remus said, getting up, toast in hand. "I'll get the door."

Remus hadn't wanted to answer the door. It would be cold outside, and he didn't want to let any of the winter air into the store. But, he reasoned, it was probably Sirius. Who else would ring the doorbell at eight on a Saturday morning?

And he was right.

"Remus!" came Sirius's muffled voice through the glass, grinning idiotically. "Can I come in? I got bored of my family, and I thought I'd come and spend some time with yours."

"Right," Remus said, "so you'll be wanting breakfast."

"I'll have that slice of toast you've got there," Sirius said.

"I'm afraid that this is _my_ breakfast," he said, taking a bite from the toast.

Sirius frowned. "Can I at least come in? I'm freezing my arse off out here."

Remus shrugged, and kept eating his toast. It was _damn good_ toast.

"_Reeeeeemuuuuus_," Sirius whined, shivering slightly.

Remus finished his toast after a few minutes, and decided that he'd been cruel long enough. He opened the door, and Sirius came flying in along with a gust of bitter wind.

"You bastard!" Sirius cried with a smile. "And look, you've bloody eaten my breakfast."

"That was _my_ breakfast," Remus said as they walked towards the stairs.

"I might need to absorb some of it back from you," Sirius said.

Remus was about to ask what he meant by that, but when they reached the middle of the staircase, out of sight of the storefront, but not yet in view of Remus's parents, Sirius launched himself upon Remus and forced his tongue into his mouth.

"That was _my_ breakfast," Sirius said, winking. Remus had to cling on the banister to stop himself from falling over.

"Remus, who was it?" his mother called from the kitchen/makeshift dining room.

"It's just Sirius," he called out.

"Hello, Sirius," Remus's father called back. "How're you going today?"

"Not too bad," Sirius said, entering the kitchen with a flourish. "A little cold."

"Well, we haven't got the _best_ heating in here," Remus's mother said, "but it's better than outside. Would you like some toast?"

"No, thank you," Sirius said politely, "I just popped over for a little chat with Remus."

Of course, Remus knew _exactly_ what that meant. Ever since that morning in the art room, they had been taking advantage of every free moment together for kissing, which turned out to be rather a lot of fun. Remus had learnt to control the urges to talk to Sirius about his stupid and over-intrusive emotions, because the only times they could really talk like that would be when it was just the two of them, and when it was just the two of them, they usually had better things to do than talk.

"I've always liked your bed," Sirius said as Remus locked the door to his bedroom behind him. "That one morning when I came and slept in it with you, all I could think about was all the other things we could be using it for, other than sleeping."

"For which we could be using it," Remus said, adding "and before you ravish me, we can't do _too_ much on my bed. Not while my parents are around."

"Can I ravish you on it?" Sirius asked, pulling his best puppy-dog eyes.

"If you must," Remus said, feigning apathy.

Sirius walked rather close to Remus and took his hands. "Remus, may I _please_ ravish you upon your bed?"

Remus grinned. "But of course."

Ever the gentleman, Sirius kissed Remus's cheek, before leading him to the bed, and gesturing that Remus get on first. Remus obliged, and sat down cross-legged. Sirius then wasted no time in pouncing on Remus and pinning him down to the bed.

"Do you remember the first time this happened? On your bed?" Remus asked suddenly, before Sirius could go any further.

"Of course," Sirius said. "I was _trying_ to tell you that you were madly in love with me."

"And you kissed me on the cheek. How long had you been trying to tell me?"

"Forever," Sirius said ambiguously. "But times have changed, Comrade. Long gone are the days of obvious hints which you really don't get, and kissing on the _cheek_, that most boring part of the body."

"Obvious hints including asking me out on that 'date'?"

"I was being serious," Sirius said, pouting slightly.

"You were being Sirius," Remus amended.

"I love it when you make that joke. It's almost as good as when you correct my grammar. Uh... so can you open your mouth? I want to stick my tongue in."

Remus thought for a moment, his mouth closed. "I... Sirius! That's an awkward sentence. How am I supposed to correct—"

"You're not," Sirius said, lowering himself and sticking his tongue into Remus's open mouth. _Stick in my tongue_, Remus thought after a few moments, _of course. Why didn't I work that out earlier?_

Then he realised that Sirius was undoing his shirt in some feat of superhuman arm co-ordination, and decided that he should think a little less about grammar, and a little more about kissing.

Which could be a lot more interesting than grammar on occasion.

Remus extended an arm and entangled his fingers in Sirius's hair, which was surprisingly smooth. Through no intention of his own, his other hand came up to the small of Sirius's back, and untucked his shirt. After all, Remus's was now entirely unbuttoned. Sirius didn't seem to mind, though. He began undoing his _own_ buttons.

"Oh my word, Remus, your chest is so cold," Sirius said, "quite possibly because I haven't been on it long enough."

"I'd say it'd have more to do with the fact that it's winter."

"I disagree!" Sirius proclaimed loudly, flattening himself so that he was lying flush atop Remus. Remus blushed. He and Sirius were about the same height, which meant that certain... parts... of their bodies were at the same level.

"This is nice," Sirius said, flopping down and burying his head in the crook of Remus's neck. "I wish people weren't such idiots. I wish we could do this all the time."

"Can you imagine what James would say?" Remus said with a slight laugh. "He'd go ballistic."

"James would—" Sirius began, before suddenly sitting bolt upright. "JAMES! I completely forgot! I came here to get you for... for..."

"For what?"

"I don't know. James wanted to do something. Wanted to show us something, I think. He, uh... he said he wanted us to meet him at the Leaky Cup."

"When?" Remus asked. He would much rather stay in his bed with Sirius than go out into the freezing cold.

Sirius checked his watch. "Half an hour ago. Shit."

Remus sighed. It looked like he'd be braving the Hogsmeade winter after all.

They got up and hastily readjusted their clothing, and Remus pulled on as many layers of warmth as he could.

"Do you think two scarves are too much?" he asked Sirius.

"Definitely," Sirius said.

After saying a hurried goodbye to Remus's parents, and after Sirius had grabbed a piece of toast, they dashed out the door and set off at a brisk pace to the Leaky Cup. It wasn't too long a walk, as the bookshop was just a few streets down from it. When they got there, James, Peter and Lily were standing outside, looking highly annoyed.

"Darn it, Sirius, what took you two so long?"

"Sorry," Sirius mumbled, blushing ever so slightly. "Next time call Remus and tell him to pick _me_ up on his way."

"That would be counterproductive," Remus said. "Next time, don't get so distracted."

"Don't be so distracting!" Sirius retorted.

"Well when you two are done arguing," James snapped, "you can follow the rest of us, who've been freezing our butts off out here."

"Sorry," Sirius said again, striding to keep up with James, who had already started storming ahead.

"So where are we going?" Peter asked. "You haven't told us anything!"

"The important thing is to look casual," James said, "like we're not going anywhere specific. We're just going for a walk. And whatever we see – well, we're not going to show too much of a reaction, okay?"

"You could start by slowing down a bit and walking normally," Lily said, catching up with James and putting a hand on his arm. James immediately calmed down slightly, but only after shooting Sirius an angry look, as though it was all his fault that he was walking too quickly.

Remus couldn't help but feel irrationally jealous watching James and Lily walk along with their arms linked. He knew that Lily had probably not even let James kiss her properly yet, but he'd give up half of the kisses he had with Sirius for the chance to walk down the street together, arm in arm, and not be driven out of town with torches and pitchforks and a lynch mob.

He shared a brief look with Sirius, and could tell that he was thinking along the same lines.

"Oh, look," James said forcedly as they passed the Town Hall, "there's something new on the noticeboard."

"Oh?" Lily said, playing along and making Remus suspect that James had already told her what they were going to see.

"Yeah, let's go have a look," James said, beckoning for them all to follow him up to the noticeboard.

There, right in the middle, was a new sign with the heading "DO YOU HAVE ANY INFORMATION ABOUT THE SO-CALLED 'MARAUDERS'?"

As James had said, they tried their hardest not to show any reactions. Below the heading, the sign read: "The leaflets distributed by this subversive organisation are becoming a public nuisance. Any citizens with information on the person(s) behind this will be handsomely rewarded upon coming forward."

"See?" James said in a whisper. "We're a proper subversive organisation!"

"Let's head back to the Leaky Cup," Remus suggested. "And no smiling until we're further away."

The others nodded, and began walking back in the direction of the Leaky Cup. As soon as they were there, James jumped up and whooped loudly.

"Did you see?" he said excitedly. "Did you see what it said?"

"A _subversive organisation_," Sirius whispered, grinning cheerily.

"We're _infamous_!" Peter said, awed and pleased by the idea in equal measures.

"I'm so proud of you all," Lily said. "Let's get something to eat in celebration."

"It's not lunch yet!" Sirius protested. "And I just ate Remus's toast!"

"Doesn't matter," James said, "we have to get out of the cold, at least."

"_Fine_," Sirius said, acting disappointed. But they all knew that getting out of the cold was the first thing on anyone's mind.

They took a table near the back and sat down. "Who's taking the order this time?" Peter asked, eager to get his food.

"You are," James said. "Are we all getting our usuals?"

There were noises of assent all around, and after some prodding from James, Peter got up to order at the counter.

"So what exactly _were_ you two doing this morning that made you so late?" Lily asked Remus and Sirius.

"Eating toast," Sirius said brightly, ignoring the spreading blush on Remus's cheeks.

"Right," Lily said, rolling her eyes.

"No, really!" Sirius said. "It was so good. There was raspberry jam. Everything tasted of raspberries afterwards."

"Did it actually?" Remus asked nervously, reading a lot more into it than Sirius probably meant.

"It's not a bad thing," Sirius said pointedly.

"You two are so weird," James said as Peter returned to the table. "Don't you think, Pete? Aren't Black and Lupinski the weirdest of us Mar— us lot?"

"I guess," Peter said distractedly. "I hope our food arrives soon."

"Calm down!" Sirius said. "You only just ordered it!"

Peter frowned.

"Well then," Lily said, deliberately making conversation, "have you lot got any plans for Christmas?"

"Yeah," James said, his expression suddenly souring, "we're going up to see relatives in Vancouver. It's going to be even bloody colder."

"Aw, James, I'll miss you!" Lily said, which instantly improved James's mood.

"We're going away too," Peter said. "Los Angeles."

"I wish I could go there instead," James said. "It'd be WARM!"

"Looks like it'll just be us, then, Comrade," Sirius said to Remus, winking.

"Ew, Sirius," James said, wrinkling his nose, "don't be such a sleaze."

"Yeah, Sirius," Remus said, glaring at him. "Don't be such a sleaze."

Sirius kicked him under the table.

"Besides," Lily said, "you'll have me!"

Remus could think of a lot of benefits of having Lily around – unfortunately for his current state of being none of them involved him and Sirius kissing under some mistletoe, his _fantasie du jour_.

"Great," Sirius said sarcastically. "I can't look at centrefolds with a _girl_!"

Lily scoffed.

"I've got an idea!" James said suddenly. "I'm back soon after new years. The whole lot of us can go for a road trip to the Shack."

"The Shack?" Lily asked, slightly amused.

"The Shrieking Shack," Sirius explained. "It's this abandoned shack just out of town."

"Why do they call it 'Shrieking'?" Lily questioned.

"People think it's haunted," Remus said derisively. "It's so farfetched. I mean, it's not like you hear a howl coming from it every full moon."

"So it'll be completely safe, then," Lily said.

"Absolutely," James said. "And to show you just how safe it will be, you can have a room to yourself."

"How is that safe?" Peter asked. "She might get—"

"Just stop there," James said. "It's safe because I won't be around to prey on her in the night." He nudged Lily with a salacious grin.

"Right," Lily said, rolling her eyes.

"So, when do you get back, Pete?" James asked.

"December twenty-ninth," he said.

"I get back on the third of January," James said, "so we'll go a couple of days after that. I'll room with Sirius and Peter can room with Remus. How does that sound?"

"Not happening," Sirius said immediately. "I'm rooming with Remus. Why can't you room with Peter?"

"Peter snores," James said logically, "and you and I are light sleepers. Remus could sleep through a tornado."

Sirius just grunted. He could argue later.

Their food came and went (in some cases more quickly than others) and eventually they decided to head back to their respective homes.

Except for Sirius.

"Remus! Can I come back to yours now? We have some unfinished business..."

"I guess so," Remus said. "After all, my parents will be down in the bookshop by now."

"Fantastic," Sirius said. "We can eat some more _toast_."

"It's too late for toast," Remus said jokingly.

Sirius laughed. "I don't care. I am a flouter of rules!"

They got back to the bookshop in no time, and Remus's parents were delighted and surprised in equal measures to see Sirius back again.

"Hello, boys," Remus's mother said. "How was your outing?"

"Get up to anything _interesting_?" his father added.

Sirius raised his eyebrows. "We had lunch with James, Peter and Lily."

"Evans too!" Remus's mother exclaimed. "Who would have guessed?"

"Not I!" his father said. "She's such an innocent young woman."

Sirius gave Remus a look that plainly said "I'm not even going to ask." Remus replied with a look that said "yes, don't ask. Please."

But if Sirius _was_ going to ask, that thought was soon pushed from his mind the moment they entered Remus's bedroom.

* * *

That was a bit dialogue heavy, wasn't it? Well, I hope you liked it anyway. PLEASE LEAVE A REVIEW! They really do mean the world to me; that's no hyperbole. And I reply to every one.

Until next time!

- _Legs_


	8. Christmas

That's right... another chapter! This one is a little bit different - I've been wanting to do a more Sirius-POV chapter for a while and now I finally got around to it.

Oh, and also? This is shamelessly fluffy. You'll love it anyway.

* * *

8. Christmas

Sirius had never much cared for Christmas. Every year would be exactly the same. He'd wake up at six but not leave his bedroom until midday for a lack of anything better to do, and then he'd go downstairs, where his mother would have unwrapped her jewellery, his father the watches and ties, and Regulus his age-appropriate clothing and books. In fact, if Sirius was lucky they'd all already have vacated the family room and he'd be left alone to unwrap his age-appropriate clothing and maybe a pair of cufflinks if he was particularly unlucky. His parents had stopped buying him books after they'd found all those Playboys a couple of years ago. That was unfortunate. But then again, it gave him an excuse to go to the Lupin bookshop.

But this Christmas was going to be different. Of course, Sirius would still wake up at some ungodly hour, extract himself from his room after playing solitaire (in both senses of the phrase) and unwrap his presents once everyone else had left. But then he'd cut and run and make his way to the bookshop for what would possibly be the best present he'd ever receive. He was going to get past First Base.

Of course, this had pretty much been Sirius's plan since he was fifteen and discovered that it was a lot more interesting fantasising about kissing his second-best friend than women who would probably want to get married and have children and do nothing but make doilies and arrange flowers. At least that was what he presumed women did in their spare time.

Remus most certainly wasn't women. He was definitely male - they'd _all_ seen Remus's chap that time at the Shack. Maybe Sirius's eyes had lingered a bit longer than they should have, but that was beside the point. There were certain things that men were _not_ meant to do, and fantasising about other men was right on the top of that list, along with urinating in public when there were women around, and making doilies.

That was what his parents and Sunday school teachers had said - men begat with women, or something. But Sirius had never payed attention in Sunday school and he would do anything to go against his parents' wishes. And that was when he decided that he would be a man who begat men - whatever begat meant - or, more specifically, a man who begat Remus Lupin. Because it wasn't men in general. Sirius still appreciated a good pair of tits.

It was just Remus.

Hence Sirius's plan formed. He was to get to First Base with Remus before his eighteenth birthday - which he had not achieved. It was soon enough after, though, that he counted it as a success. And now he was eighteen he felt he had been stuck on that base for too long. Despite all the girls who apparently fancied him at school (even though he honestly had no idea - this was all James's word) Sirius had only ever kissed one person. And he wanted _more_.

So this Christmas Sirius was going to give himself the present of getting inside Remus Lupin's pants. And if all went to plan, it was going to be _brilliant_.

He emerged from his room at eleven-thirty, because he had not had the temerity to perform his one-man Christmas ritual - not when he would be getting past First Base that afternoon - and so he'd had nothing to do all morning except look at vaguely unsatisfying pictures of tits. Which was probably a good thing, because if they'd been satisfying then his afternoon would lose some of its purpose.

Thankfully, the family room was already empty, and Sirius collected his presents and returned to his bedroom, putting them at the end of his bed. They could wait. He had a baseball metaphor to attend to.

Sirius frowned. In his mind, he'd just ended a sentence with a preposition. This was not unusual in itself, but the fact that he'd noticed it was slightly alarming. Remus was rubbing off on him.

Oh, jolly good.

In a few moments, Sirius's mind was no longer filled with grammatical corrections, but a much more pleasing mental image.

Feeling adventurous, Sirius locked his bedroom door from the inside and made his exit through the window. It was bloody cold, but he was comforted by the thought that he would soon be _much_ warmer.

Of course, the bookshop was closed. Sirius briefly contemplated climbing in through the bedroom window again, but that would hardly be courteous to Remus's parents.

It had been a long time since Sirius had cared about courtesy. About fourteen years, to be precise. But then again, he'd never been in love before.

Not that he'd tell Remus that he was in love with him. That was such a girly thing to do.

A few minutes after he'd knocked, Remus's mother opened the door, her eyebrows hovering around the middle of her forehead.

"Heavens," she said, "hello, Sirius."

"Afternoon, Mrs. Lupin," he said politely. "Merry Christmas!"

"Shouldn't you be celebrating Christmas with your family?" she asked. "Not that we mind your visiting."

Sirius shrugged. "They're boring. I... I haven't bought presents, but I can buy some chocolate when the shops open up again."

"Nonsense!" she said. "Come on in, you silly boy."

He thanked her probably more profusely than was necessary, and followed her up the stairs to the flat above the bookshop.

"Remus, look who the blizzard blew in!" Remus's mother announced, entering the kitchen with Sirius. Remus and his father were sitting at the dining table, both reading the same newspaper at different paces.

Remus flinched. "Mother, prepositions! Please... 'look who blew in with the blizzard'."

"Or 'look who was blown in by the blizzard'," Sirius suggested, much to everyone's astonishment.

"I prefer my way," Remus said. But Sirius noted that he was smiling like all his Christmases had come at once. Which was rather appropriate, really, seeing as it was Christmas day.

"Well, at any rate," Remus's father said, breaking through the tension, "you're just in time for lunch, Sirius. We're not having anything like what you'd be used to, but—"

"Don't apologise," Remus and Sirius said at the same time. A stunned silence descended over the room.

"I'll just get the potatoes in the oven, shall I?" Remus's mother said, flustered, making her way to the kitchen counter.

Sirius was pleased to note that Remus was blushing as hard as he presumed that he himself was. In his mind, it all led to the obvious conclusion – that they were made for one another.

Lunch was pleasant, if slightly awkward. But it was certainly more enjoyable than any meal Sirius had ever had at his _own_ house. The Lupins didn't even say grace, they just straight to the eating. And occasionally everything would stop in favour of a long-winded political discussion. There were never any differences of opinion or shouting matches like sometimes occurred at Black mealtimes, but friendly spirited conversations on current affairs. It would have been wrong for Sirius to want to get married to Remus just so that he could join his family. He supposed that he could just leave home one day and turn up at the bookshop with his sketchbooks and clothes, announcing to Remus's delightful parents that he was eloping with their son. Well, they were left-wing enough, but Sirius didn't think _any_ parents of an only child would be too pleased to know that their son wouldn't be carrying on the family line, and instead going to live in New York with his male not-husband. At least that was the plan. Remus didn't know it yet, but it was definitely the plan.

During one of the spirited conversations over lunch, Sirius learnt that Remus's parents somehow knew all about the Marauders. And they didn't care. Sirius was _beyond_ elated. He wished that they were _his_ parents.

If he and Remus _did_ elope to New York, which they _would_, they would be sure to come back to Hogsmeade every Christmas.

After lunch, Sirius's developing plan had been to go back to Remus's room and hit a home run, but Remus's parents were staying in, and Sirius knew that if he did things correctly there would be a _lot_ of noise. So while they drank eggnog and rum (barring Remus – he was still seventeen and his parents wouldn't let him _touch_ the rum) Sirius made some slight alterations to his plan.

Did he _really_ want to lose his virginity in a public park in the middle of Winter?

He thought on that one for a moment.

Did he care?

Not really.

"Hey, Remus," he said during a rare lull in the conversation, "do you want to go for a bit of a walk?"

Remus blushed unreasonably frequently, Sirius decided.

"Sure," Remus said, ignoring his parents' protestations that it would be incredibly cold. "Let me just go and get a coat."

Sirius followed him to his bedroom and kissed him, just for good measure.

"So," Remus said once they were out of the house, "to where exactly are we walking?"

"That was a skilful avoidance of a preposition problem," Sirius said, skilfully avoiding the question.

"When did you start noticing prepositions?" Remus asked with a smirk.

Sirius frowned. "It's your fault!"

"I'm not complaining," Remus said softly, nudging Sirius in the side with his hand.

"We're going to the park," Sirius said.

"Anything you'd like to add you that?"

"Not really."

They walked on in silence the rest of the way, with their arms occasionally brushing as they walked unnecessarily close to each other. Sirius felt a shiver running through his body at every touch. Not that he'd tell Remus.

They reached the park and Sirius immediately began scouting out for good spots to deflower Remus. The central lawn was surrounded on all sides by thickets of oak trees, which would provide good cover. Plus, it was Christmas day, and everyone would be at home trying their hardest to stay warm.

But if physical contact didn't warm up a person, then Sirius was lost for ideas.

With a light tap on the elbow, Sirius led Remus towards a particularly thick-looking thicket. As soon as they were out of sight of... well, anyone, Sirius wasted no time at all and launched himself upon Remus with incredible gusto, pushing him up against a tree. It was all he could do to stop himself from ripping Remus's clothes straight off. But that would involve the placement of a preposition at the end of a sentence.

"God damn you," Sirius mumbled into Remus's neck, "now I'm correcting myself in my head."

"You never cease to amaze me," Remus said. "And if you _are_ going to make a mark on my neck, at least do it below my clothes so no-one asks questions."

Sirius feigned shock. "But that would involve removing part of your clothing!"

Remus rolled his eyes. "If you have to, be quick with it. It's freezing out."

Sirius beamed. He could not imagine feeling more love than at that moment. He swiftly swept aside Remus's many layers of clothing like a professional and made short work of the promised mark. He was pleased to note that Remus seemed none too put off by this.

"Remus," Sirius whispered, "I'm going to do something a little naughty now, and I'm counting on your compliance, okay?"

Remus bit his lower lip and nodded. "Coming from you, Sirius, that sounds a little worrying..."

"Don't worry," Sirius said, "I mean, I've never done this before, but I think you can trust the Black charm to get it right for me."

Remus was about to ask "Never done what before?", but was interrupted by a hand in his underpants. Oh my.

"This is pretty good," Remus said breathily, as Sirius learnt on the job, so to speak, giving his _first ever_ hand job.

"Hell, I think I'm enjoying it more than you are," Sirius whispered.

"Do you know what you're doing?" Remus asked. "I mean, have you read anything on the subject?"

Sirius laughed. "I love you," he said suddenly, his heart acting ahead of his mouth acting ahead of his brain.

Remus froze and grabbed Sirius's active arm. "You—"

But whatever he might have been about to say was cut off by the sound of a dog barking. A few seconds later the dog bolted past them and out of sight. They both stood completely still. When the sound of a female voice calling out to the dog ran through the forest, Sirius hastily withdrew his hand from Remus's underpants and Remus tidied away the evidence.

"Rosie!" cried the voice. "Rosie, where have you gone?"

Sirius stepped back from Remus, but they kept their eyes glued to each other. Remus was no doubt in shock over what Sirius had inadvertently blurted out. Out! That was a preposition at the end of a sentence. Sirius was so in love it was not funny.

The female voice was coming closer, but neither of them were paying any attention any more. Remus was still backed up against the tree. Sirius wished his hand was still in Remus's underpants.

"Rosie, come on! Where _are_ y—Remus? Sirius?"

Both boys turned at the sound of their names.

"Lily!" Remus said in astonishment. "Uh... merry Christmas!"

Lily looked at them both with a baffled expression on her face. "Merry Christmas," she said absently. "What are you two doing out here?"

"What are _you_ doing out here?" Sirius shot back defensively.

"Walking the dog, obviously," Lily said, "only she's run off... but that doesn't answer my question!"

"We were just going for a walk," Remus said.

"In the trees?" Lily asked sceptically, one eyebrow raised.

"Yeah, so what?" Sirius snapped.

"So nothing!" Lily said, clearly bewildered. There was an awkward silence. But Lily broke it a few seconds later, her face splitting into a wide grin. "Oh!"

"Oh what?" Sirius asked in an accusatory tone. Remus sighed and rolled his eyes.

"It must be pretty convenient for you that both James and Peter are away," she said.

Remus paled and Sirius blushed a bright red. "Why would you say that?" Remus asked cautiously.

"You two are at it, aren't you!" she said. It wasn't a question.

Remus nodded feebly and Sirius shook his head vigorously. When Sirius saw Remus giving a positive gesture, he turned to him and pointed a finger. But he found that nothing could come out of his mouth. Instead, he turned back to Lily with some renewed confidence. "Yeah, we're at it. Why, are you jealous?"

Lily laughed loudly. "Jealous? Unlikely! You're forgetting that I've got a boyfriend of my own, Sirius."

Sirius wilted slightly in defeat.

"You won't tell anyone, will you?" Remus asked quietly.

Lily smiled amiably. "Of course not. It's none of anyone's business what you two get up to in your spare time."

"Thanks," Remus said, returning the smile.

"How do we _know_ you won't tell?" Sirius asked, his eyes narrowing.

"You're an idiot, you know?" Lily said sharply. "Remus, your boyfriend is an idiot." She turned back to Sirius. "I didn't tell anyone about the Marauders. You should know better than to distrust me."

Sirius blushed apologetically. "Sorry," he mumbled.

"It's okay," she said, more kindly. "I get it – not everyone would be too happy about this. And you'll want to watch yourselves on our trip to the Shrieking Shack."

"Bloody James," Sirius said angrily, "putting me in a room with him and shoving Remus with Peter. It's not fair."

"Well, he doesn't know, does he?" Lily asked.

"Are you kidding?" Remus said. "James would probably murder us both!"

Sirius was glad to note that they agreed on that one point.

"I've got an idea," Lily said. "I'll bring James into my room at some point in the night, so Sirius, your room will be free for Remus to come in."

Before Remus could even open his mouth, Sirius responded.

"In! That's a preposition. They don't go at the end of sentences, Lily," he said.

"You've got to stop doing that," Remus said, a hint of annoyance in his voice. "It's _my_ job."

Sirius grinned cheekily. "It's _everyone's_ job to lead the crusade against poor grammar!"

Lily looked on with amusement, while Remus pouted, almost comically. "Just don't do it when I'm around, okay?"

"Fine," Sirius said, rolling his eyes.

"I'd better go and find Rosie," Lily interrupted. "I'll leave you two lovebirds to your own devices."

And with a wink, she disappeared off among the trees much as her dog had done earlier.

There were several minutes of uncomfortable silence.

"She called you my _boyfriend_," Remus said quietly, his eyes slightly glazed over.

"So what do you think of allowing your _boyfriend_ a return to your nether-regions?"

Remus shivered, and Sirius hoped it was from the cold. "I'd rather just head home, if that's fine with you."

"Absolutely fine," Sirius said, only sounding a _little_ bitter.

They walked the whole way back to the bookshop in complete silence.

Remus was about to turn his key in the door when suddenly he pulled back, as though something had just occurred to him.

"Sirius, did you mean it?"

"Mean what?" Sirius asked, a little bit confused. Really, one shouldn't start a conversation without any real indication of what the conversation was about.

"Did you mean it when you said 'I love you'?" Remus asked again.

One look at his face and Sirius knew exactly the answer he needed and wanted so very badly to give.

"I did. I _do_ love you."

Remus turned pink, and beamed so warmly at Sirius that he could have melted all the snow in sight with his smile.

"I love you too," he said, and without another word slipped into the bookshop and closed the door behind him.

Sirius danced all the way home. So much for every Christmas being the same – he hoped they'd all be more like this one in the future.

* * *

OH MY. DID THEY JUST... ?

Yes. They did. Leave a review ;D  
(You WILL get a reply.)

On another note, myself and Lacrima now a have a TUMBLR! So if you want to see my shitty mcshitness drawings of assorted scenes, go to lege-et-lacrima .tumblr .com (but remove the breaks)... take some time to have a look!

- _Legs_


	9. Trousers

Oh my lawd, what do you call this timing? I'm so sorry I'm such a terrible updater, guys. And this is coming right in the middle of exams, too. But I think if I spent any more time on fanfiction I'd fail my HSC. Hum. For those of you who still care about _Between Love and Hate_, I haven't given up on it! The next chapter will come as soon as... I get it done. Which might be a while. But I've not given up! (Unlike _Heads and Tails_. I don't even-)

Thank you to everyone who's been reading and enjoying and reviewing! I hope you like this chapter...

* * *

9. Trousers

This time Remus didn't wear his best trousers.

For one, he didn't want Peter to throw up on them on the drive up to the Shack, and for two, he had plans for the not-very-good trousers he was wearing, plans that involved maybe discarding them in a fit of passion, and he didn't want to throw them aside only to find them crumpled the next morning and in bad need of pressing.

Thankfully for the sanity of everyone concerned, James had Lily with him this time, and so Remus, Peter and Sirius were not going insane from his awful tuneless singing. No, the main sense of awkwardness was their occasional kissing in the back seat. James was sitting in the middle, and Sirius kept complaining that he could see them tonguing a bit too clearly in the rear-view mirror.

Since their last road trip, Sirius's driving skills had improved considerably, and he wasn't swerving as much. That, combined with the fact that Remus was in the front passenger seat at Sirius's insistence and Peter was in the back, meant that really one of Remus's reasons for not wearing his best trousers was invalid. But the second one still stood.

Remus was finding it rather hard to concentrate on any of the conversation on the drive over. All he could think of was the plan that Lily had hatched to lure James into her room that night so that Remus and Sirius could get up to a bit of fun in the room that had been allocated (by James) to James and Sirius. Usually they'd all just sleep on the floor of the lounge room, but it was different this time - they had a girl with them. James had explained, when it was just the four of them, that they needed to appear civilized, otherwise she'd never want to get in his pants. Sirius had pointed out drily that they were already going out, but James insisted that appearances were everything.

"So what's the plan for this afternoon, then?" Peter asked during a particularly awkward silence on the drive.

"I was thinking we could draw up some plans for our next _List_," James said. "Sirius, maybe you could do a new cartoon for this one."

"Sure thing," Sirius said, "I was thinking Mayor Riddle being sodomised by Senator McCarthy."

"Sirius!" Remus said automatically. "Indecent!"

Sirius winked at Remus out of the corner of his eye. "That's me all over."

"No, I'm with Comrade Josef on this one," James said, "maybe it's a bit too soon to publish cartoons involving sodomy."

Lily giggled. "It's such a silly word, isn't it? _Sodomy_."

"It's disgusting, that's what it is," James said, wrinkling his nose. "Why would you want to stick your chap where someone craps?"

Remus and Sirius exchanged a quick glance. "I don't know, man. There's no accounting for taste," Sirius said.

"Yeah, I'm not against people doing it," James said, quick to reinforce his liberal views, "I just don't understand _why_."

"Me neither," Peter said. "It's just _odd_."

"Well, think about it rationally," Lily said, "how else can two men have sex?"

James nearly choked on his own saliva. "Lily! Why would they _want_ to?"

"That's a preposition," Sirius mumbled inaudibly.

"It's called homosexuality, James," Remus said, putting on a voice like he was talking to a slow five-year-old. "_Some_ men prefer the company of their own gender."

"But _why_?" James pressed, completely unaware that there were two people in the car who could quite easily answer his question with very little thought. If James had known that they were in some sort of relationship, and had asked them, Remus knew his answer would without a doubt be "Sirius Black".

"I don't know why," Remus said, "why not?"

"Yeah," Sirius said, "I don't see anything wrong with it."

"Neither," Lily added. Remus could hear the supportiveness in her voice and was glad of it.

"Well it's not natural, is it?" Peter said, shrugging.

"You've got me wrong," James said, completely ignoring Peter, "I don't _object_ to it. There's nothing _wrong_ with it. It's just beyond my comprehension."

"Fair enough," Remus said lightly, "we can't all be born with an acute sense of empathy."

Sirius snickered. James just sat pouting in the backseat. "Lily, all this talk is doing nothing for my masculinity. Can I kiss you for a bit?"

Lily pretended to think it over, and then shrugged. "Well, why not."

The car once again descended into silence as James and Lily became connected at the mouth once more.

Remus _so_ wanted to be doing the exact same thing to Sirius, there and then. He kept catching Sirius's eye, and he never ceased to be amazed by how much could pass between them in just one glance. It was quite arousing.

Thankfully Remus's best trousers were also his best-fitting, so in this second-rate pair he had plenty of room for concealment if ever he started thinking in rather too much detail.

It was something of a relief when Sirius pulled up outside the Shack and they unloaded the boot, dragging their not-quite-burgeoning bags inside with them. They were only staying for one night because Remus's parents needed him around the shop and Lily's parents didn't trust her for any longer with a group of four teenage boys. Quite sensible, really.

Of course, Lily was allocated the biggest and best room on the second floor of the Shack. James and Sirius were in the other bedroom down the hall, and Remus and Peter would have to make do with the smaller spare room on the bottom floor, because Peter snored and Remus could sleep through a tornado.

"It's silly that we're sleeping in separate rooms, isn't it?" Peter said as he and Remus were putting their bags down. "Usually we're all fine in the lounge. I don't get why we couldn't all be in the lounge and Lily could have the big bedroom."

"But don't you think it's nice to be civilized for one night?" Remus asked.

"Civilized my butt," Peter moaned, "we'd be sleeping on the floor either way."

"Fair point," Remus conceded. There was a double bed in both of the upstairs bedrooms, but the spare room required them to drag cushions in from the couches in the lounge if they were to get any sleep at all. Which of course didn't matter to Remus - the amount of sleep he was planning to get, and indeed the amount of time he was planning to spend in that room, was minimal.

They all met up in the lounge room a few minutes later. Sirius and James were talking animatedly about the big bed in their room, and who would get to sleep where, before Lily had come down.

"I'm telling you," James said, "I don't have those dreams anymore! I'm not going to be all over you in the middle of the night!"

"I don't care," Sirius said, "you've done it before, so there's a chance you'll do it again."

"Should I be scared of you?" James riposted. "I mean, you probably dream about shagging birds. What if you try and get one over me in your sleep?"

Sirius scoffed; clearly the thought was abhorrent to him. And of course he knew of the evening's arrangements, and would most certainly _not_ be getting one over anyone except a certain person who was most certainly _not_ a bird. "I don't dream about shagging birds," he said in what could have been construed as a boastful tone.

Peter furrowed his eyebrows. "How can you _not_ dream about shagging birds? What else is there to dream about?"

"About which to dream," Remus said.

"You don't only have to dream about sex," Sirius said pointedly." James only does it because he's so enamoured with his lady upstairs, and you, Pete, dream about it because you're not going to get some any time soon."

James beamed at Sirius. "Does that mean what I think it means? Does our dear Sirius have a lady-love all lined up?"

"No!" Sirius said, a bit too quickly. But he covered for himself smoothly: "I only mean that little Pete is so awkward around girls that he's got no hope with them, unlike myself, a genetic recipient of the unique Black charm!"

"Oh, please," Remus said with a frown, "your family have about as much charm as Mr Flitwick!"

James laughed loudly. "Don't be too harsh on him, Josef," he said, "he's not bad - for a maths teacher."

"He's boring," Remus complained. "And he doesn't like my geometric proofs."

"That's because you're crap at geometric proofs," Sirius pointed out.

"I do them my own way," Remus said defensively.

Before Sirius could point out that Remus had never once passed a geometry test despite doing fairly well in the rest of mathematics, Lily made her grand entrance into the lounge room.

"I have to say, boys," she began, "I like this place. It's a bit creepy, but I like it."

"Great!" James said, jumping to action and slipping an arm around her shoulder. "I can guarantee that by tomorrow morning, you'll _love_ it."

"Oh good," Lily said.

"But not more than you love me," James added as a caution. Lily just laughed.

"So what's it to be then?" Peter said impatiently. "Are we going to work on the third wave of _Lists_ or what?"

"Yeah!" James said enthusiastically. Possibly the only thing he loved more than his dear Lily was being an infamous Marauder. He dashed upstairs and down in record time, emerging with his trusty notebook and a few pencils. "Let's get down to business!"

"I think we should branch out a bit," Sirius said. "Up until now, we've only listed names. We haven't really written any invective rants against the people we're listing."

"But what if our English teachers recognise the writing style?" Peter asked.

"Lily can write it, then," Sirius said.

Lily slapped him across the back of his head. "Double standards are unbecoming," she said.

"I think adding more text is quite a good idea," Remus said, "and we'll just have to be careful about our style of writing."

"See!" Sirius said with a triumphant grin. "Remus agrees with me!"

"He would," Lily mumbled. Only Sirius actually heard, because James had gone off on a tangent about who their ranting should be against.

"Against whom our ranting should be directed," Remus said.

"Yeah, that," James said absently. He was already scribbling possibilities in his notebook.

They continued in this fashion for several minutes. It was mainly Sirius and surprisingly Lily suggesting names, James taking note and Remus occasionally embellishing ideas. Peter's job was to second any motions.

"Honestly, Lily, I think you're fast becoming our fifth Marauder," James joked.

"No!" Sirius cried, ignoring Lily's glare in his direction. "Absolutely not. The Marauders are a brotherhood! A _brother_hood!"

"Would that change if _you_ got a girlfriend?" James asked. "Like Lily said, you do tend to have double standards."

Sirius shook his head fervently. "I'd never do that to the brotherhood."

Remus wondered when it had ever before been expressly stated that they were a brotherhood. And the thought also crossed his mind that it may well be different if Sirius ever had a girlfriend like Lily, who was interested in their politics and wanted to do her bit. But Sirius would never have a girlfriend. Ever. Remus would see to that.

"Since when has this exclusively been a brotherhood?" Lily asked, voicing Remus's thoughts.

"Since _we_ started it," Sirius snapped.

"Come on, Sirius," James said, "it won't be _that_ bad having a woman in the gang! Lily can be our Secretary!"

"Hey!" Peter said indignantly. "You seem to be forgetting that _I'm_ the Secretary!"

"Oh, right," James said dismissively, "well then Lily can be my personal assistant." He winked salaciously at her, and Lily blushed, looking away.

"I don't know," Sirius said, his eyes narrowed with suspicion, "I'm still not entirely convinced."

"What will it take to convince you?" Lily asked.

"Look, Sirius, Lily obviously has her heart in the right place," Remus said. "We know she's dedicated to the cause and we know she'd never betray us. So what's the problem?"

Sirius didn't reply. He had his "thinking face" on, and was looking vaguely at Remus. "Well, that makes sense."

James's eyes widened. "So you just listen to him, just like that! What about your best friend, eh?"

Sirius shrugged. "Remus makes more sense than you. He's not a lovestruck fool."

Lily grinned at the irony. It didn't pass Remus by unnoticed either.

"But hold on," James said suddenly, "Lily, you can't be a proper Marauder."

To say that Lily looked horrified would be an understatement. "What do you mean?"

"Well if we're found out, I wouldn't want you arrested with us," James said simply.

"You really are stupid," Lily said. But she gave James a small smile and swiftly changed the topic. "So back to our _Lists_! There's more work to do yet."

"Yes!" Sirius said. "I think I should draw something else for this edition. You know, keep it fresh."

"Go ahead," James said.

So the rest of the afternoon was spent in compiling the third wave of _Lists_. Sirius worked on his drawing, and the other four set to work on writing a paragraph or two. It was decided that Remus wouldn't actually write anything, mainly because his writing was all over the _Hogwarts Bugle_, and the Marauders wanted to keep their identity secret for all the obvious reasons.

The afternoon passed remarkably quickly. Remus found it quite amazing how time seemed to run faster when they were so involved in their scheming. It was a cold evening and the Shack was coated with a thin layer of frost, but the five of them decided to brave the chill in their warm clothing to eat dinner under the stars. James's mother had made them all sandwiches, and they'd snuck some marshmallows from Alice in the kitchen at the Leaky Cup to toast over a log fire.

"You were right, James," Lily said, "I _do_ love this place. This has been an amazing day."

James's cheeks glowed with pride. "We'll have to start coming ore often."

"Oh, I don't know," Remus said, "we'll have to focus more on our finals once we're back at school."

"Finals?" James asked, grinning. "You mean end-of-school-year prank, right?"

Lily shot him a dirty look.

"Anyway, I don't study," Sirius said gleefully, "and neither should you. You're a clever boy."

Remus blushed and looked at his feet. "Everyone says I'm clever. But I only do well at school because I spend all my spare time reading."

Sirius frowned. "That's not true," he said, slipping his hand over Remus's.

"Yes it is," Remus said, "and you know it. You and James don't have to do anything and you'll still do brilliantly. I actually have to work for my grades."

"Being clever isn't the same as getting good grades," Sirius said. "Sometimes you worry me, Remus."

Peter yawned loudly. "I think I'm going to turn in for the night, fellas. I'm pooped."

"Me too," Lily said. "I want to be well-rested for tomorrow."

"I'll stay out for a bit longer, I think," James said. "I've gone numb to the cold."

"Ditto," Sirius said. Remus nodded.

"Suit yourselves," Lily said. Peter was already inside, shivering as he skittered off to his and Remus's room.

"It's always really been you two," James said when the other two were gone.

"What?" Remus asked, sincerely hoping that James didn't mean what he thought he might mean.

"I mean, at first it was me and Sirius, and then it was the three of us, and then we had Peter, and now it's me and Lily, and you two."

"I don't follow," Sirius said.

"Even when I marry her," James said, "I don't want to lose contact with either of you. And I don't want either of you to lose contact with me when you get married."

"I'll never get married," Sirius proclaimed. "Neither will Remus. So we'll never lose contact with each other."

"You two are like an old married couple anyway," James said.

"That's what Peter said about you and me," Sirius said to James, "remember?"

"Poor Pete. He's a nice kid, but he's not very observant. I could _never_ marry a man."

Remus found it amusing that Sirius seemed to go to quite some extend to point out that he would never marry a man either. He himself didn't say anything.

"Maybe we should get some sleep," Sirius said eventually. "After all, I have to drive tomorrow."

"Alright," James said, getting up. He blew out the last embers of the fire and opened the door, leading them back into the Shack. Surprisingly, Lily was sitting waiting at the foot of the stairs.

"James," she said, "I was wondering if you wanted to come back to my room tonight."

James's eyes widened and he began to grin broadly.

"I don't mean to be vulgar in front of your friends, but it's really the only chance we'll get for a while," she continued.

James looked like he couldn't believe his luck. Naturally, Remus and Sirius were also rejoicing. The plan was being put into action earlier than expected.

As Lily led a dumbstruck James up the stairs, Sirius followed - but only after he'd whispered in Remus's ear, "five minutes".

In fact, Peter was the only one doing any sleeping that night. James and Lily were in one upstairs bedroom and Remus and Sirius in the other, and despite the cold there were remarkably few items of clothing involved. However, Remus didn't end up removing his trousers until later in the evening - good thing it wasn't his best pair, then.

* * *

DON'T FORGET TO LEAVE A _**REVIEW**_! I guarantee I'll leave you a reply.

So, um... that was pretty dialogue-heavy, wasn't it? Maybe next time there'll be more snogging.

On another note, keep your peepers peeled, because pretty soon I'll be uploading a BRAND NEW STORY, like I don't already have enough shit on my plate. Tee hee. It's a crossover fic, I'll tell you that much, but as for the rest, well... you'll have to wait and see!

Also, if you haven't checked it out already, you should have a look at our tumblr account! There's a link on our profile and it's full of crappy art. You'll love it.

- _Legs_


	10. Intelligence

An all-new chapter! Hopefully the wait wasn't too painful. This one may _seem_ like a major padding-chapter, but it actually has a lot of plot hidden in it. You know, the kind of thing that you only realise is significant later. So read on, lovelies. This chapter is for all my beautiful readers - I hope you enjoy it. Also a special shout-out to **Your Greatest Fear** who is a total BAMF and reviewed like every single chapter of every single one of our fics. Lacrima and I love you.

Now, on with the show!

* * *

10. Intelligence

It seemed like a matter of seconds, not days, until the winter break was over and Remus was packing his briefcase in the morning for a day of school. He had missed it, of course, but he would probably miss the holiday more, what with all the sneaking around and snogging and goodness-knows-what with his _boyfriend_. It sounded so silly. Girls had boyfriends, boys had girlfriends. That was how it usually went. But Remus had a _boyfriend_. Sometimes he would whisper it in front of his mirror and look at the shape his lips made. It was surreal.

It was also generally frowned-upon. That was Sirius's turn of phrase - Remus supposed it was acceptable, since you could claim that "frowned-upon" was an expression, and so didn't conform to the general preposition rules. Yet despite the nature of their relationship being frowned-upon, both of them knew that it was none of that teenage experimentation, nor simply a passing phase. It was the real thing.

Sirius had promised Remus that one day they would go to New York, where apparently no-one really cared who you were sleeping with as long as you paid your rent. Remus didn't know whether that was true or not, but he did tell Sirius that he would much rather that no-one really cared _with whom_ he was sleeping. Sirius maintained that it conformed to the "frowned-upon" exception, but Remus still had his doubts.

The first day back at school felt different somehow. It could have been because there was only half a year left until they were finished, or it could have been because Lily winked at Remus when he and Sirius arrived together. Or perhaps it was because Peter had an enduring tan, or because James and Lily were very openly dating now.

Remus also sensed that there would be less dramatic pranks in the future. James and Sirius were the double act, the instigators, and now they both had romantic distractions, public and private respectively. If given the choice, James would sooner spend an evening out with Lily than drawing up a schematic for the strategic deployment of smoke bombs across the school - that much was obvious. Yet Remus was well-aware of his own double-standards - if given the choice between spending an evening in with Sirius or helping him draw up a schematic for the strategic deployment of smoke bombs across the school, he damn well knew which one he would choose.

After their first day back was over, the five of them went out to the Leaky Cup for some hot drinks. It was a freezing January day, and Remus could think of nothing more satisfying than going back home with Sirius and spending an indefinite amount of time in his bed. But the Leaky would do. They sat down at their normal table towards the back.

"Pete, you ordering?" James asked, not taking his eyes off Lily.

Peter glared at James momentarily, before getting up and going to the counter to order. James kept grinning at Lily. She blushed.

"James, stop it," she hissed. "It's not nice to stare."

"You're my girlfriend," James said proudly, "and I can stare at you whenever I like."

"No you cannot!" she said, frowning at him. Sirius rolled his eyes and tapped Remus under the table with his foot.

Peter returned and sat down with a shiver. "It's damn cold," he said. "After this, I think I'm just going to go home and sleep. I don't care what the time is."

"Or if you have any homework to do," Remus said, grinning slightly. Peter just shrugged.

"How about you, honey?" James asked, touching Lily's arm lightly. "What'll we do after?"

Lily shook her head. "Sorry, James, it's my sister's birthday. She's got the evening off work so we can celebrate."

"Pah!" James said loudly, giving the waitress a bit of a fright as their drinks arrived. "Petunia doesn't need a birthday party."

"Just because she called you a fish-face?" Sirius whispered.

James slapped him on the shoulder. "Is that fat Republican at the hardware store still trying to get in her pants?" he asked, changing the subject.

Lily giggled. "You mean Vernon? He's still sending her flowers every Friday. It's cute."

"He's ugly," Sirius said, "and he gave me a weird look when I bought- well, never mind what I bought. The point is that he gave me a weird look."

Remus raised his eyebrows at him, but James seemed to pass over it. "So there's no way you can skip out on her do, then?" he said, prodding Lily lightly.

"Afraid not," she said. "But don't worry! We'll do something tomorrow after school, okay?"

"Sure," James said, sounding resigned to his fate.

Lily frowned. "I... I'm just going to go to the little girls' room. Sorry, I'll be back in a minute."

James's eyes followed her as she went through the door to the bathroom. It was as though something funny had come over her.

"What was that all about?" Peter asked.

"Probably her lady-problems," Sirius said, wiggling his eyebrows stupidly. James slapped him again. Remus kicked him under the table.

And then Remus had an idea. "Hey Pete, do you think you can postpone your early sleep for a bit? I've got an idea for what we can do once Lily heads home."

"Would it be worth me not sleeping?" Peter asked suspiciously.

"I should hope so," Remus said.

"Spit it out, then!"

"Well, it's just that we haven't really pulled any pranks in a while," he whispered, "and quite frankly, I'm afraid we're getting a bit rusty."

"But we've got our other thing," James said. "You know, our _secret_ thing..."

"That's true," Remus said, "but that's different. Getting people to think about the way the government is treating them is different to having a bit of harmless fun and annoying some teachers."

Sirius grinned. "I don't know what they've slipped into your drink, Comrade, but I _like_ it."

"I'm sure you do," Remus muttered.

"Really!" Sirius said emphatically. "You're brilliant. It's a brilliant idea. Let's all go back to your place and plot when Lily leaves."

"Sure," Remus said. "After all, my parents will be downstairs working. We'll have the second floor to ourselves."

"I suppose I can put my sleep on hold," Peter said with a shrug.

"Fantastic, Remus," James said. "I can't wait."

"What can't you wait for?" Lily asked, sitting back down after having made an unnoticed exit from the bathroom.

"Never mind," James said with a wink, getting a glare in return.

The time passed extraordinarily quickly, and with all their drinks finished the four of them headed out into the cold. Lily said her goodbyes and headed towards her house for Petunia's party, not without James and Sirius making a rude joke or two about her suitor Vernon. And then they made their way back to Remus's house.

Mrs. Lupin was positively delighted to see the four boys. "It's so good to see the four of you _working_ together," she said, winking at them. Sirius winked right back and tipped an imaginary hat at her, and James and Peter exchanged a confused look but neither said anything.

Remus's bedroom wasn't exactly the warmest room in the house, so they all piled onto his bed and sat in some sort of a circle. Peter was at the foot of the bed, dangerously close to falling off, and James sat just to his left. Remus was propped up against the headboard and Sirius sat in front of him at an angle that made it easy for him to turn his neck and look admiringly at Remus just in case he needed reminding of their secret liaison.

"So come on then," Peter said, bouncing up and down on the weak mattress, "what pranks are we going to pull? Smoke bombs?"

There was a universal groan. "How many times, Pete," James said, "do I have to tell you that we've moved _beyond_ all that?"

"We need to do something with a bit of intelligence behind it," Sirius said, sounding a little bit like a newsreader.

"I've noticed that!" James said, and he was met with blank stares. "I mean, I've noticed that our Comrade Black is becoming more... more intelligent."

"Hey!" Sirius said. "What's that meant to mean?"

"You're more into books and that sort of thing than birds and sex," James elaborated. "It's odd."

Remus suppressed a very loud laugh that was threatening to erupt. Instead, he simply shook his head. "Is that necessarily a bad thing?"

"It's different with you," James said. "You've never been that mad to get a leg over. But Black's always wanted sex. The number of times he's-"

"Shut up, idiot," Sirius said, "Remus is right. There's nothing wrong with me being intelligent. Besides, intelligence is pretty sexy."

As James and Peter burst into raucous laughter, Remus flushed red.

"I mean it!" Sirius said, also blushing slightly.

"Good for you," James said. "Jeez, now I wish I'd never mentioned it."

"No," Remus said, "it's nice to hear someone else confirming your suspicions."

Sirius was still blushing, an unusual sight indeed. "Is it really that obvious?"

Peter shrugged. "_I_ didn't notice."

"Thanks man," Sirius said dully, "that means a lot."

"Anyway, we're getting off the point!" James said, waving his hands about dramatically. "We need to get to work on a new prank. Something big."

"Well," Sirius began, tracing circles on Remus's bed with his finger, "we still haven't really spoken about our end-of-year prank yet. And we'd best start planning early, since it's our last year and this needs to be big."

James nodded enthusiastically. "This has got to be bigger than the smoke bombs. Bigger than the _Bluelists_."

"Bigger than the Manifesto!" Sirius added, his eyes twinkling. He exchanged a conspiratorial grin with James - they were in their element.

"Not with a bang, but with a whimper," Remus said, as though he was thinking aloud.

"I thought we were just saying that we wanted to do the opposite!" Peter said, suddenly very confused.

"No, no," Remus said, "I was quoting. It's T.S. Eliot, from 'The Hollow Men'."

"So he had the wrong idea then, didn't he?" Sirius confirmed.

"Oh yes. Well, for our context, the wrong idea. That and he was a fascist."

"Ugh!" James said. "To think I almost _enjoyed_ reading his stuff in English! A fascist! I'll never be able to take him seriously again!"

Sirius nodded his head solemnly, as though to show off just how much he understood the gravitas of the situation. They sat in silence for a few moments, before Peter suddenly burst into a fit of giggles.

"Oh, guys, I just had the silliest idea... ! But you won't like it, will you? We have to do _intelligent_ pranks now..."

Remus frowned. Perhaps they had stressed the idea of intelligence a bit too much. It really wasn't poor Peter's forte. "Well why don't you tell us anyway? If it made you laugh that much, it must be worth sharing."

"Uh, well... you said 'not with a bang, but with a whimper', right? So I was thinking what a funny thing that was to say, and then I was wondering what can either bang or whimper, and that's when it hit me! Fireworks!"

James punched the bed with such force that Peter let out a gasp and nearly fell off. Sirius lurched backwards and Remus had to grab his shoulders to stop him from doing some nasty damage to his head, which in any other situation would have led to lots of kissing.

"BRILLIANT!" James shouted. "_This_ is why we keep you around, Pete. Fireworks are just the thing! We'll get up on the roof and let off fireworks as everyone is leaving the school after getting their finals results."

"And we can get different colours and make patterns and aim the particularly violent ones at Snivellus!" Sirius added.

"What _I'm_ wondering," Remus said, "is how we're going to get our hands on that many fireworks. I mean, a couple of little crackers, sure. But you guys are thinking big, Fourth-of-July style fireworks, aren't you?"

"That's how we'll get our fireworks, then!" James said. "Our finals finish towards the end of June, right? So we'll get our results mid-July. We can buy our fireworks around the fourth."

Ever the devil's advocate, Remus still wasn't convinced. "And _of course_ any general store would let a bunch of schoolboys buy a tonne of fireworks."

"We won't _need_ to go to a general store," Sirius said, "because we'll be killing two birds with one stone. Every year the Chamber of Commerce put on a big show for the Fourth of July, don't they? So we can nick their fireworks. That'll get us our ending with a bang, _and_ it'll annoy Mayor Riddle."

"And _where_ will we hide them?" Remus pressed.

"At the Shack," James said, grinning like a hyena. "It's all coming together! This is going to be amazing!"

"But won't all the fireworks be red, white and blue?" Peter said. "We'd look really... un-subversive... I mean, it wouldn't look much like a prank."

"If we just use the red ones we can show our political colours," Sirius suggested. "In fact, we could _just_ steal the red ones. They can't have a display with only white and blue!"

"Ironically, we'll have taken the red _out_ of Hogsmeade," Remus joked.

"All in aid of putting it back _in_, my good man," Sirius said, smiling in a way that he usually only did when they were alone.

"So we're agreed, then?" James said. "We'll nick the red fireworks from the Chamber of Commerce, we'll hide them at the Shack, and then we'll let them off on the roof when everyone leaves Hogwarts for the last time."

"We'll be remembered for sure," Remus said, rolling his eyes.

"Our names will go down in history, men!" James said. "We, the Marauders, will be famous in the years to come. Trust me, five years from now _everyone_ will know our names. They'll say, 'oh, those Marauders, so bravely fighting for freedom under the oppressive rule of Mayor Riddle', and then they'll build statues of us, and we'll be rich and famous, and we'll just... we won't have to hide our opinions anymore."

"We won't have to hide _anything_," Sirius said, casting a glance at Remus. James noticed this glance, and furrowed his brows.

"I should head home," Peter said. "Dad usually gets me to sweep up the hair on the floor of the shop around now."

They said their farewells and Peter headed out into the cold, leaving just Remus, Sirius and James. With Peter gone, James spread himself out more across the bed.

"Come on then," he said, "what are you two hiding?"

The other two were completely caught off guard. "What do you mean?" Sirius asked hesitantly.

"You said 'we won't have to hide anything' just before, didn't you? And then the two of you exchanged a shifty look."

"It's nothing," Remus said immediately. Sirius signalled his agreement with a nod.

James raised an eyebrow. "Are you _sure_ it's nothing? Thinking back on it, you two have been acting funny for a while now."

"I'm sure it's just your imagination," Remus said with a reassuring smile.

"Now, see, I don't think it is," James said, narrowing his eyes. "I think you two are up to something. Something you don't want me to know. And you guys are my best friends, so whatever it is, you owe me the truth."

Remus sighed. "James, we've been-"

"- plotting!" Sirius cut in. "We've been plotting a, uh... a surprise. Well, it was going to be a surprise party for you. But you've sort of negated that now."

James laughed. It was almost a cruel sound. "I don't believe that for a moment. And I'm not leaving here until you tell me what's been going on."

Sirius and Remus shared a nervous look. Remus was so shocked he didn't even notice the preposition.

"Okay," Remus began, "I'll tell you, but you've got to promise not to get mad."

"Or murder me," Sirius added, "because there's a _high_ chance that you'll murder me."

"Gosh, anyone would think that you've been doing something more illegal than distributing subversive literature," James said with an anxious laugh. "Have you?"

Sirius shrugged. "I don't really know anything about the law. Remus?"

"I'd be willing to put my money on it being illegal," he said with a self-conscious frown.

"Shit," James said. "Well now you've _got_ to tell me."

"I don't know how to put it into words," Sirius admitted. "It's sort of indescribable."

"No it isn't," Remus said bluntly. "James, we've been doing things like... like the things you do with Lily. But with us two instead."

"YOU'VE HAD SEX?" James shouted, wide-eyed, and Sirius pounced on him, covering his mouth with one hand and slapping him with the other.

"Indeed we have not!" Sirius said primly, glowering at James. "Not yet, anyway."

"You've... you've done that with Lily?" Remus asked, incredibly surprised.

"Just a bit," James said, barely audible through Sirius's hand. "Just once, that time at the Shack."

Remus rubbed his face in his palms. "Oh god..."

Sirius released James from his muffling grip. "So you two are... ?"

"Yeah," Sirius said, "we're going to run away together and get married."

James laughed. "Makes sense then why you were so defensive of buggery."

Remus really did not want to be thinking about that with those two in the room. He blocked all the mental images out of his mind. "You can't tell anyone," he said. "Promise."

"I promise!" James said. "It's a bit weird, yeah, and I'll take a while to get used to it, but friends keep secrets. We're a brotherhood, and we're no less of one just because two of our finest are making whoopee with each other in secret."

"Exactly," Sirius said, looking supremely pleased with himself. Remus sat back happily against his bed's headboard. He could not have hoped for more than begrudging acceptance from James. And now that they had a direction for their end-of-year prank, and the Marauders were still going strong, and there was one less skeleton in his closet, Remus couldn't help but feel that everything might just work out for the best after all.

* * *

Will everything work out for the best? You'll have to keep reading to find out! Why don't you leave a **review** and let me know what you thought of this chapter? It would absolutely make my day.

And yeah, updates are getting sporadic. I finish school in about two months, and after that is my HSC ("finals" for you non-NSW kids). But I hope to get chapter 5 of BLaH on the go. And I've got two new fics on the go - a neat little crossover and a next-gen Ministry of Magic fic with lots of swearing Scottish men. It's going to be totally awesome!

So stay tuned!

Love,

- _Legs_


	11. Suspicions

Oh HELL yes. I get the feeling I'm getting faster at this "updating" lark. Enjoy it while it lasts - in a few weeks I'll be buckling down again to study for the actual HSC. I'm crazy-excited for it... is that so unusual?

Anyway, enjoy the chapter. This is for EACH AND EVERY ONE OF YOU who is still reading and enjoying - you guys are fab.

* * *

11. Suspicions

Remus found it was genuinely incredibly difficult to keep the smile off his face.

It was hard not to smile when you were on the roof of a school with a crisp breeze blowing your clothes about, and you were sitting in a circle with your best friends drinking tea. Sirius had "liberated" some of the finest Black china and a teapot that he had managed to fill with steaming water, possibly by sneaking into the school's boiler room. What had started as a plan to scope out the school roof for their Amazingly Brilliant and Explosive End-of-Year Prank had ended in a tea party. Remus thought that there was something quite delightful about it.

"Chin chin, chaps!" James said in a near spot-on imitation of Sirius's accent. He checked his watch. "It's seven thirty on a Monday morning and the Marauders are celebrating their latest victory in planning an Amazingly Brilliant and Explosive End-of-Year Prank. President James Potter, that's _me_, had the idea of approaching the school roof one fine morning, and I think the other Marauders will all agree that it was a truly _spiffing_ idea."

Sirius slapped him on the arm. "This just in! James Potter, President of the Marauders, is a complete and utter _tool_!"

"This just in, Sirius Black, Vice President of the Marauders, has a dick for a brain!"

Peter snickered. "Good one!"

"This just in," Sirius said, "Peter Pettigrew, Secretary to the Marauders, licks arses for a living!"

"Ew," Peter said, scrunching up his face, the idiom having completely gone over his head. "That's not even the _good_ kind of sex. That's like... that's just _wrong_."

"You never know what turns people on," James said, wiggling his eyebrows stupidly.

"Preposition," Remus said quickly. "I would suggest saying 'what attracts some people' or 'what might tickle someone's fancy'."

"I'll tickle _your_ fancy," Sirius said, giving Remus a salacious wink. Remus blushed, taking a sip of tea to obscure his face. Sure, James knew that they were in a relationship, but he didn't know any of the intimate physical details. He didn't know that Sirius actually _had_ tickled Remus's fancy (if by 'fancy', one meant 'penis').

"Please never tickle _anyone's_ fancy," James said. "It sounds... somehow dirtier than just plain old sex."

"That's because it's a euphemism," Remus said, "and they have a nasty habit of over-softening certain vulgarities to such a point that they themselves take on the vulgar aspects, often to a greater degree."

"How is it," Sirius began, "that you can make even _sex_ sound intelligent?"

"Because intelligence is sexy," he said, "and that's a direct quote."

Sirius pulled a stupid face at Remus, before chuckling to himself. "I don't deny my own prowess for quotability."

"So fellows," James said, abruptly changing the topic (possibly to avoid thinking about his two best friends having intelligent sex), "what do we think of the roof? Suitable for our little display?"

"It's perfect," Sirius said in a tone of admiration. "We've got a direct view from the one side down over the front steps - and presuming that everyone will exit in a group after we get our results, then we'll be able to get the whole lot at once."

"We should make a speech," Remus said. "Just to thank everyone for... for putting up with us."

James snorted. "And to tell them all what we really think of them!"

"And then we can shower them in ticker tape!" Peter said.

"But that's a _good_ thing," James said, evidently confused.

"Not if it gets in their eyes or hair," Peter pointed out.

"Men, please! We're getting off track," Sirius said, clapping his hands loudly. "Let's focus on the matter at hand."

"And what might _that_ be?"

The four of them froze. That sounded like- but it couldn't be-

"Miss McGonagall?" James exclaimed. "What're you doing up here?"

"More to the point," she said, "is what are _you_ four doing up here?"

Sirius held up the teapot and his cup indignantly. "Having a tea party!"

"And I presume you're aware that the roof is _strictly_ off-limits to all students?"

Peter, James and Sirius shook their heads innocently. Remus just sighed.

"Come on then," she said. "To my office, please. _Now_."

They quickly scrambled up, teacups in hand, and poured the remaining tea over the edge of the building while McGonagall climbed down the stepladder ahead of them. She led the way to her office, striding tall, and opened the door with a flourish. The four boys slumped in and clustered in front of her desk.

"So what have you got to say for yourselves?"

"We were having a tea party!" Peter said quickly. It seemed that this would be the story to which they were sticking.

"On the roof," McGonagall stated with a disbelieving frown.

"Yeah," James said, straightening his glasses, "we were just... we just wanted to see what it was like, yeah? On the roof."

"Which is prohibited," she reiterated.

"We didn't know that!" James said.

"We honestly didn't," Remus said. And he _was _telling the truth. Somewhat.

McGonagall eyed him with one of her trademark glowers. "Lupin. I'd expect better of you, as Editor of the _Bugle_."

Remus at least had the decency to look shamefaced. "I am incredibly sorry, Miss McGonagall. It will never happen again."

"Yeah, leave Remus out of this," Sirius said quickly. "It wasn't his idea. He was just with us because he's _always_ with us."

"Sirius-"

"No, shut up Remus. It wasn't your idea. It was _my_ idea. These are _my_ teacups, _my_ teapot."

"Is this true?" McGonagall asked, looking at James and Peter.

"Absolutely," Sirius said. "It was all my plan."

"In that case," McGonagall began, taking a few moments to collect her thoughts, "in that case your punishments shall be as follows. Potter, Pettigrew and Lupin - a week of detentions writing 'I will not disobey the school rules' for forty-five minutes after school each day. Black - three hours of lines in my office now, and then a week's suspension, effective today."

James gasped. "You can't do that!"

"I think you'll find that I can," she said, "and that I just have."

Remus bit his lip. He hadn't wanted this to happen. _None_ of them had wanted this to happen.

"It's alright," Sirius said boldly, "I'll take it like a man."

"You've got no other option," McGonagall said, a small smirk pulling at her mouth. "Now, leave the teacups here, if you please, and the three of you can leave now, but you will report directly to my office for detention after school."

They nodded, and all four stood to go.

"Not you, Black," she said. "May I remind you that you're writing lines now?" She got out a pen and paper.

Sirius shared a small smile with Remus as he, James and Peter left her office.

As soon as they were a fair distance away, James burst. "Fucking McGonagall! Fucking fuck! How the fuck can she do this? A week of detentions! _Suspension_! We were just on the roof, for fuck's sake! And fucking _Sirius_, being all noble and taking the blame. Why the _fuck_ would he do that?"

"Because he wants Remus to be able to keep his job as Editor," Peter said sensibly, "and if Remus isn't the Editor, we won't have an excuse for going down to the print room."

James frowned. "I guess _that_ makes sense. But he could have let the two of us take some of the blame too!"

"It still doesn't make sense," Remus said suddenly. "How did she know that we were on the roof?"

At that point, Severus appeared from around a corner, a wicked grin on his face. And Remus knew the answer to his question.

Evidently, so did James.

"You!" he snapped, rounding on Severus. "You little fucking slime. How did you know we were up there?"

Severus raised an eyebrow at him, feigning ignorance. "I don't know _what_ you're talking about, Potter."

James grabbed his collar and pulled him up to his face.

"I'll ask you again. You told McGonagall that we were on the roof. How'd you know we were up there?"

He gave a cold, cryptic smile. "Are you sure you want an even harsher punishment for beating me up?"

"'Bashing me'," Remus said automatically, before he could stop himself, "or 'hitting me'. You shouldn't put a preposition like 'up' at the end of a sentence."

James dropped his grip on Severus, who stumbled backwards and almost fell on the floor. "You are a brave man, Lupin," James mumbled.

Severus shot Remus a dirty look. "Just keep out of my way," he snapped, turning away from the three of them. "You three, you _four_, just keep away from me." He walked quickly in the opposite direction.

James stifled a laugh with his hand. "Fucking _fantastic_, Comrade. That was _priceless_!"

Remus shook his head. "I'm honestly getting sick of him sneaking around. Why can't he just leave us be?"

He stopped himself from ranting, because he was suddenly overcome with a surge of emotions that were wholly unnecessary.

"People like him don't even _deserve_ to know people like us," James spat. Peter nodded fervently.

"I hate him," Remus said suddenly. "I've tried, I've fucking tried not to hold his irrational hatred against him. But this is the last straw. I fucking _hate_ him."

This was anger. And it was new. It wasn't something that Remus had every really had cause to feel before. He'd always been so calm. He'd always taken it so well. But it was obvious that Severus had told McGonagall that they were on the roof, which had led to Sirius's suspension. And that Sirius had been so stupid, so noble, so... suspended - _that_ made Remus angry.

"You _swore_," Peter said, his voice full of awe.

Remus nodded. "I just hate him that much. Next wave of _Bluelists_, we're escalating the vitriol. We need to get personal."

James slapped him on the back amicably. "I think I don't mind you when you're angry," he said.

"Get used to it," Remus said.

For the rest of the day, Remus let his anger slowly fade away. It was hard without Sirius. He hadn't realised just how mad he was about him until he was forced to spend a whole day at school without looking at him or talking to him. Every time he saw Severus, his blood boiled anew, and he made up his mind to go straight to the Sirius's house straight after school. He would climb up the side of the house and enter Sirius's bedroom through the window as he'd once left it.

At the end of the day, he bade farewell to James, Peter and Lily, and began the long walk to Sirius's house. He had to go past his own home on the way, so he thought he might as well stop in there and pick up some food to take to Sirius's. He figured that if he was stuck indoors, Sirius would be keeping well out of the way of his parents and Regulus, and staying in his room without so much as venturing out for food.

He was halfway to the bookshop when he felt a tap on his shoulder. "Lupin."

Remus spun around a little bit dramatically to see Severus. It seemed that he was just not leaving Remus alone that day. The hate exploded again within him.

"What do you want, Snape?"

"I'm on to you lot," he said.

Remus kept a straight face and raised his eyebrows. "I beg your pardon?"

"I know that the four of you are up to something. And I can tell that it's something big."

"You're talking nonsense," Remus said.

Severus shrugged. "I'll find you out. I'll get you, you can be sure of that."

Remus bit back a nasty comment about Severus's misuse of a preposition and simply shrugged back at him. "I don't know why you're telling me this."

"I'll get you," he hissed, "you just wait."

"I could care less!" Remus snapped sarcastically, turning and walking quickly away. He walked progressively faster until he was sure he was out of Severus's line of sight. Then he ran. He ran more quickly than he ever knew he could, and in what felt like no time he was at the Black mansion. He walked around to the side where Sirius's bedroom window was, but suddenly the climb looked awfully daunting.

Mustering every last reserve of strength in his skinny arms, he gripped onto the pipe work of the house and hoisted himself slowly but carefully, and in a good seven minutes or so he was at Sirius's window. He'd climbed out of it before, so he knew it was the right one, but the curtains were closed and he was overcome by a dreadful paranoia that threatened to fling him backwards and break several bones.

He tentatively tapped on the window. There was no reaction, so he tapped again. Remus clung on tight so that if the curtains were flung open he wouldn't fall down in shock. That was a very real possibility.

The curtains opened slowly, and Sirius peered through a crack in them. He grinned wildly and quickly opened the window, helping Remus through and safely inside.

"What are you doing here?"

"I brought you- oh. I forgot to bring you food." Remus frowned. Time to change the subject. "Why would you take all the blame like that?"

"I _had_ to," Sirius said. "You know that."

"Pete said it's because you didn't want me to lose my job as Editor," he said quietly.

"Oh!" Sirius said, slapping himself on the forehead. "I didn't even think of that! I just did it because, well... it's you. And I didn't want you to get into any trouble."

"How chivalrous," Remus said, rolling his eyes. "You didn't have to do it."

"Yes I did," Sirius said, like it was the most natural thing for him to have done. That made Remus overwhelmingly happy, and he forgot for a few fantastic moments his ardent hatred for Severus.

So of course Sirius just _had_ to remind him of it.

"So how'd McGrumpy know we were on the roof?" he asked, jumping onto his bed and gesturing for Remus to do the same. Remus climbed on and buried himself amongst Sirius's fine collection of pillows.

"Snivellus," he said, "the sneaky bastard. I don't know how he knew, but he did. James will no doubt be telling you about my, uh... explosion of rage."

Sirius wrapped himself around Remus, frowning. "Was it that bad?"

"He's a detestable piece of shit," Remus said. "But I can't be so angry when I'm with you. I think it's because you weren't there - it was a bad day. I've never been so angry in my life."

"I wish I could have been there. I would have hit the fucker for you."

"Don't say that," Remus said, glowering at him, "you're _already_ suspended!"

"I'd spend my life away from school if it kept you out of trouble."

Remus snorted. "I don't need you keeping me out of trouble. I'm a model student!"

"Yes, but subversive literature? Homosexuality? That's several laws broken right there. You're a right rebel, you are."

"If that's your idea of rebellion, then you're just as much a rebel as I am. If not more."

"Why are we talking?" Sirius said suddenly. "Why have I not kissed you yet?"

Remus shrugged, resituating himself atop Sirius. "I don't know." He bent down and pressed their lips together, channelling his earlier anger into passion. Sirius instantly reacted with a start and pulled Remus closer. Remus could feel something hard digging into his thigh, and it took him a few moments and a little less focus on his tongue to realise exactly what it was. He pulled his mouth away from Sirius and, biting his bottom lip, plunged his right hand straight in, mimicking what he remembered of the time Sirius had done the same to him. And from the reaction he was eliciting, it seemed he didn't need to do any reading to get it right.

"I can't wait for school to finish," Sirius mumbled once Remus was finished, "then every day will be like this."

"Every day!" Remus exclaimed. "Surely we'd get tired of it?"

"Never," Sirius said, smiling contentedly. "I will enforce the one-hand-job-a-day rule once we are living together in New York."

"If you insist," Remus said, reclining against him. "Do you think you'll be allowed to come over for dinner tonight? I think my parents quite like having you around."

"I'm fast becoming the son-in-law, am I?" He chuckled. "I doubt I'll be _allowed_. But provided you didn't break the pipes on your way up, I think I might just come anyway."

"Brilliant," Remus said, kissing Sirius again before extracting himself from the bed.

As they climbed down the pipes, Remus began making plans for after dinner. Surely there was nothing wrong with two-a-day?

* * *

Now the plot is really getting started! Expect the following chapters to be less fluffy, more thinky. And don't forget to **leave a review**! I'll send you a reply. ;D

- _Legs_


	12. Attack

What can I say? HSC? School? Life? Well, I am SO sorry that it's taken me forever to write this chapter. But I hope you like it, even if it's a bit shorter than usual. Thank you all for sticking with me - I love you all more than I can say. I'm off to Europe soon, so I'll have my laptop on all the flights. Stay tuned.

* * *

12. Attack

"_Vitriol_," James said, "that was the word you used."

Remus nodded. "That was _exactly_ the word I used."

"It's such a nice word," Sirius said, looking up briefly from his work in progress - a cartoon of Mayor Riddle being sodomised by Senator McCarthy with the caption "_Our esteemed Mayor takes his orders_".

The third wave of _Bluelists_ that had been planned during their overnight visit to the Shack were all but forgotten. The text edited to incorporate a bit more anger and directness. The list itself became more personal. And James had given in and allowed Sirius his sodomy cartoon. Remus saw it a bit like sending Lydia to Brighton in "Pride and Prejudice" - once she'd done it, and seen what a bad idea it was, she'd never do it again.

So as they sat in James's bedroom, recompiling their pamphlet and discussing the specifics of vitriolic prose, Remus found that he had somehow become the overseer of their marauding ways. James was the one putting it out there, so to speak, coming up with the ideas and directing the troops. Sirius was indeed his lieutenant, seconding every motion and drawing up the battle plans. Peter was the infantryman, doing the hard work, but every so often acting of his own accord and steering the battle in a new direction. And Remus was the neutral ground on which they were fighting, making sure everything stayed sane, stitching back together the loose ends and cleaning up the mess. And that wasn't necessarily a bad thing.

"What do you think?" Sirius asked, dangling the crude cartoon in front of Remus's face. "I'm thoroughly enjoying Riddle's sex face."

Remus bit his lip. As always, Sirius's drawing was excellent, but this was just - this was just something else. "It's great," he forced himself to say.

Lydia to Brighton. Lydia to Brighton.

Sirius grinned. "My finest work. One day they will hang all of my erotic art in the finest galleries of Paris, and they'll say 'oh zat Seereeahs Bleck, 'ee was trulee an arteest'!"

"I'd hardly call it erotic," James scoffed.

"Hey," Sirius said, probably more defensively than was necessary, "just because it's two men doesn't make it any less erotic."

"I was referring to _who_ they are, actually," James said with some amusement.

Peter looked wholly affronted by this whole discussion. "Can we _please_ not have another discussion about sodomy? It's bad enough that we have to look at the damn drawing."

Sirius smirked - if he could offend the least-observant Christian in Hogsmeade, he could do _anything_. He felt strangely empowered by this ability to offend.

"What I'm more worried about," Remus said, "is that you suggested that this isn't your first foray into the world of erotic art."

"We'll discuss that another day," Sirius said dismissively, "what _I_ want to know is how the introductory paragraph is going. President?"

James stood to attention with a large grin. "So here's what I've got so far: '_Ladies and Gentlemen, there was a time for bringing the wrongs of this regime to your attention. That time has now passed. The increasing harshness of the move against those with Communist sympathies and wrongly suspected Communists alike calls for a renewal of our forces against oppression. Either you are with us or you are against us, because what we stand for is simple - we stand for-_'"

"Hold on," Remus interrupted. "That for which we stand?"

"Oh, come on," James said, "it's the middle of a clause, not the end of a sentence. The world will cope." Remus frowned. "May I continue?"

"Just keep going," Peter said.

"'..._ what we stand for is simple - we stand for the right to believe in anything, and say whatever we like. We are on the side of freedom, and our government is in the wrong._'"

Sirius gave a whistle of approval - like a catcall, only substantially more appropriate. "That's brilliant."

"If only you could write like that in your essays," Peter joked.

"Hey! I do well in English." James gave Peter a shove, and almost knocked him off the edge of the bed.

"So have we got everything now?" Remus said hastily. "Introductory paragraph, revised list including annotations, cartoon..."

"That's pretty much everything we need," Sirius agreed. "We should be ready to make copies in the ungodly hours of Monday morning."

"When your suspension is lifted," Remus said, suddenly overcome by a strong sense of relief. He'd been going mental at school without Sirius. Sure, he'd seen him every afternoon, but at the expense of homework, and so he'd been lagging behind a little bit. But soon everything would return to normal.

"We've missed you, man," James said, as though he read Remus's thoughts. "I can't cope in maths without you turning my graphs into tits."

"Those double-parabola things," Sirius said fondly. "I've missed _them_!"

"Oh, toughen up," Peter said. "There's something wrong with you if you miss _maths_! And after only a week!"

Sirius smacked him over the back of the head. "I'd like to see _you_ spend a week without seeing us every day. It's unjust!"

"I reckon I'd manage," Peter said boldly.

"Want to test that theory?" Sirius mumbled.

"Guys, guys," James said, "no fighting! We've got to work on compiling the _Lists_ so we can get them to the mimeo on Monday!"

"Good idea," Remus said, shuffling together a few papers. "I'll put it all in order, shall I?"

Just then, James's mother knocked on the door. "Do you boys want to come down for some shortbread cookies?"

"Yeah," James called out, "just give us one second." He tidied away all the papers, including Sirius's cartoon. "My mum's shortbread cookies are second to none," he said proudly. Remus was struck by the effortless transition from fearless general to model son. He grinned to himself at the thought.

As it turned out, James's mother's shortbread cookies were _fantastic_. But she'd made so many that there were enough left to bring to Hogwarts in the ungodly hours of the morning as the four boys ran off enough copies of the _Bluelists_ to fill every letterbox in Hogsmeade. They were printing more than usual, since the plan was to shove them all around the Town Hall too, to really send the message where it needed to go.

It was Remus's turn to crank the mimeo, but his arms had given in half-way through, and Sirius chivalrously took over, flippantly stating that the health of Remus's arms was incredibly important to him. James nearly choked on his shortbread. It was probably for the best, then, that Remus decided not to add that both of them would be gaining a good bit of arm strength that morning.

"This is our best wave yet," James said happily. "I'm mighty proud of us lot."

"They'll be quivering in their boots," Sirius said, gathering up the printed pamphlets and concealing them at the very bottom of his bag. "Are we heading out at three tomorrow morning?"

James nodded. "We'll get in early. I'm thinking we'll split up, cover the suburbs and the town centre."

"Good plan," Sirius said.

"If we're expanding our clientele," Remus said hesitantly, "perhaps I could come out and help you?"

Sirius frowned. "So long as you don't get yourself in harm's way."

"As if I would," Remus said. "I can do the town centre - I live closer in than you two."

"So do I," Peter chimed in, "I can do the centre, and you can take the East."

"Are you sure the exercise won't kill you?" James asked with a laugh, prodding Peter's substantial stomach.

"Fuck off," Peter mumbled, "it'll be fine."

"Right then," Sirius said. "We'll meet in Remus's backyard to distribute the literature, and then head off our separate ways."

"Sounds like a plan," James said.

The pamphlets all concealed, the four of them headed out of the _Bugle_ office and made their way towards another day of school.

Remus didn't particularly show it, but he was _elated_. Yes, it had only been a week, but he hadn't enjoyed being at school without Sirius. It was odd just how strongly he'd felt his absence. But now that he was back, the feelings were even stronger. It was maddening. Just being around Sirius would end in arousal. Remus could barely keep it in.

It was _not_ good.

So Remus was thankful of James and Peter's presence in his backyard that night - well, early morning- because he was really beginning to doubt his own powers of restraint.

"Peter, you're doing the centre," James began, handing him a bundle of pamphlets. "Remus, Eastern suburbs. Sirius, down South. And I'm taking the Western suburbs. So we'll all be able to get home easily. Leave no stone unturned."

They all nodded. It was going to be a long night.

Morning.

"We'll aim to meet back here at oh-four-hundred hours," James continued.

"Look at you," Sirius mocked, "you're turning into a right military commander!"

"He reads too many comics," Peter said. "Turning into one of those stereowhatsit generals."

"You can just go home now if you're going to be disrespectful, Peter, and I'll force Remus to do the centre too. D'you want that?"

Peter glared at James and said nothing. James nodded. "Right then. If that's all, then we'll get going."

"Yeah, that's all," Remus said quickly. "Let's go."

Remus stuffed his hands in his pockets as he made his way into the cold night alone. For the sake of hiding their identities, all four had makeshift balaclavas fashioned from old socks, which also served as good protection from the cold. But as luck would have it, there was a frosty wind blowing and Remus was as good as flat on the pavement half the time. The Eastern suburbs of Hogsmeade were probably the least-expansive area, and bordered on open country, tapering into a highway leading to the closest city. Still, Remus couldn't cover it all on foot in three or so hours, so he focused himself to the parts nearest to the city. They would be the most likely to be affected by the tyranny of Mayor Riddle.

His fingers were shaking from the cold and he was having issues separating one pamphlet from another. For a moment he wondered if this was what his Russian ancestors did. He knew that his parents had left due to their poverty, as a young married couple with an infant son, but he knew nothing about his grandparents and uncles and aunts and cousins. He wondered if any of them were radical Communists, or White Russians, or disenchanted distributors of subversive literature.

He realised just how little he knew about his life.

When it hit him he was standing outside a large house with perfectly kept gardens. Most of the rich families lived in South Hogsmeade near Sirius, and this house looked almost out-of-place amongst the darkened single-storey homes in the street with barely any light. There was a birdbath at the centre of the garden, covered in frost. The lawn was surprisingly uneven and tall - but as Remus's eyes adjusted to the dark he noticed that the reason the garden seemed to be so well-kept was that there were no actual plants. It was just the lawn, the birdbath and a series of shapes that Remus couldn't really make out. But no plants. Remus lived in the city, but he still had a small backyard with a few well-looked-after plants, and even the single-storeys on this street had a few bushes, and the odd flowerbed. This house was just empty. It felt lifeless. It certainly added to the atmosphere of Remus's ponderings about his ancestors - whether positively or negatively was a matter of debate.

Shivering a little from the cold, he approached the mailbox and pulled out a pamphlet with some difficulty. He was about to slip it in when a word caught his eyes.

Embossed above the mail slot was the word "Snape" in ornate Gothic lettering. It was barely visible in the dark, but Remus had a strange feeling of already knowing what it said before it became fully clear.

He ran his finger over the letters and frowned. He was spending too long standing in front of the eerie Snape residence. He slipped the pamphlet in and walked away. He didn't want to say there any longer.

He did the rest of his route in double time - it should have occurred to him faster that walking faster would keep him warmer. After a while his fingers warmed up and he really got into the swing of it. And then it was half-three, and he turned around to make his way back to his backyard. When he arrived, just after four, James and Sirius were already waiting there, balaclavas off and clearly suffering from the cold. Remus was still warm from his brisk walking, and he pulled off his own balaclava.

"Welcome back," Sirius said.

"Where's Peter?"

"He left early," James said. "Centre's not as big, so he was waiting here for ages before we arrived. Begged to be sent on his way, he did."

"Fair enough," Remus said.

Sirius walked up to him and slipped his arms around Remus. "Can I stay at your place tonight?" he asked. "I'm too lazy to go home."

"Of course," Remus said.

James mimed throwing up. "Ladies, please. Just tell me how it went, Remus, and then I'll leave you two alone."

Remus nodded and pushed Sirius off himself. "It was fine. I got rid of all my pamphlets, covered most of the East... and I saw Snape's house. The name was on their mailbox."

"Christ," James said. "What was it like?"

"It was like a graveyard," Remus said, and just articulating that thought set him shivering.

Sirius visibly reacted to Remus's discomfiture. "James, can you maybe..."

"Fine, fine! I'm leaving now. I don't want to stick around for your unique methods of keeping each other warm."

Sirius grinned. "Thanks!"

James put his balaclava back on and left Remus's backyard with a wave.

Remus turned to Sirius. "Let's head in, then."

Sirius nodded, and they silently slipped in through the back door, stepping over the precarious piles of books in the storage room and making their way to his bedroom. The room was dark, and Remus was loathe to turn on any lamps. There was a weird four-am paranoia that felt that any lights might alert other people to the fact that there were goings-on, despite the fact that anyone awake at four-am was probably also trying to hide the fact that they were awake at four-am.

When he thought about it didn't make any sense.

So he didn't think; guiding Sirius by the hand, he led them to his bed where they both promptly fell asleep. If Sirius had wanted to do anything untoward to Remus, it seemed the comforts of warm sheets and a decent mattress were enough to persuade him otherwise. Remus woke up several hours later with Sirius's hand resting awkwardly in his pants, and he didn't have the heart to shift him away. So he just lay there for a few moments until Sirius awoke.

"We've got to go to school, don't we?" he mumbled.

Remus nodded, which was harder than it seemed when lying on one's side.

"Damn," Sirius said.

"Well, on the bright side, everyone will have gotten their _Lists_."

Sirius grinned. "And the attack begins."

* * *

Please leave a _**review**_! I guarantee a reply. :)

_**Coming soon**_: THE PLOT THICKENS when Mayor Riddle decides to take his investigations into the Marauders to a new level.


	13. Questions

It's been far too long, and I can only apologise profusely. It turns out I write better when I actually have something more productive to be doing. (That and Sherlock and Homestuck sort of ate my life, oops.) But I promise that the content of this chapter _more_ than makes up for my severe lack of updating.

And thank you to everyone who's stuck with me for so long. I know it's torturous but I'm putting _Between Love and Hate _on hiatus to focus on this fic. Wish me luck! And enjoy!

* * *

13. Questions

James was the sort of person who loved seeing the look on someone's face when they reacted to one of his pranks. So it was such a pity that he'd come down with the mother of all colds on the day after the Third Wave of _Bluelists_ was distributed, Remus reflected as he sat in class that morning.

But the day had just started, and by the end of it Remus would be wishing he was James. He would be wishing that _all_ of them were James.

It started off as quite a normal day. Naturally, there was a fair bit of commotion surrounding the latest bit of literature from the Marauders. The reactions this time were extreme – either people were in giggling fits over the lewd cartoon, or they were burning it behind the gym whilst conducting highly sour-faced cleansing rituals. Someone had pasted a copy of it to the door of one of the Civics classrooms, with the scribbled additional caption of "MARAUDERS FOREVER". Sirius was so incredibly proud of this particular reaction that he nicked it at morning tea whilst no-one was around.

It was after morning tea that things really began to get interesting. Remus was sitting in math with Lily. They were always front-and-centre, taking comprehensive notes and racing each other to finish their homework. It always made Remus feel a little inadequate, as Lily was infinitely better at math than he was, but he put up with it because it was added motivation for him to work harder.

They were in the middle of one such race when Miss McGonagall entered the classroom with a stern face. Miss Vector looked up from her desk and the two ladies exchanged a worried nod. The whole class had fallen silent and none were surprised when McGonagall stepped into the centre with her I've-Got-An-Important-Announcement-To-Make face in place. There was a collective suspension of breathing as they waited for her to speak.

"Gather your things, students," she said, her voice shaking, "you're to assemble in the Great Hall immediately for important proceedings."

When it became clear that she had nothing else to say, the silence snapped with an outbreak of scuffling. People were simply throwing their things into their bags, and whispering amongst one another with their eyes trained on McGonagall.

Lily looked remarkably queasy as she gave Remus an anxious look. "I've got a terrible feeling about this," she said. All he could do was nod as they were drawn along with the wave of exiting students rushing into the corridor. It seemed that every class had been given the same message, because one by one the doors were opening and confused kids were forming a mob as they hurried to the Hall.

At first Remus thought it was war. Of course, it had to be. Why else would they call the whole school out of class? It was the Russians, or the Japanese, or the Germans even, and there would be bombings. Maybe they'd already started. But the moment he entered the Hall he realised that this was something much worse than war.

Mayor Riddle stood haughtily on the stage, flanked by some of his drones from the Chamber of Commerce, and the Headmaster stood off to one side, looking like he was bursting with rage. And then when Remus thought back, he registered that McGonagall's voice had been shaking not with fear, but anger. This _was_ war, but not on an international scale. This was local, this was personal. This was the Spanish Inquisition, and it was most certainly _not_ what Remus had been expecting.

Remus quickly found Sirius and Peter, but lost Lily in the crowd. The three boys took seats near the back. Peter looked like he was about to hurl, and Sirius was whiter than the snow outside. Remus couldn't tell if he looked as ill as they did, but he didn't feel it. He felt like a besieged warrior, and if anyone had spoken an unkind word to him at that moment he could have happily punched them in the face and sent them on their merry way.

Mayor Riddle approached the microphone and an uneasy quiet blanketed the Hall. He cleared his throat and the sound system emitted a high-pitched whine.

"By now," he began, "you will no doubt have divined what it is that brings me to your school today."

There were a few pious nods and a few cautious shakes of the head across the Hall.

"I'm here to talk about the Marauders."

At the mention of the Marauders, a flurry of inappropriate giggling bubbled up from all over the Hall. Remus could have sworn he ever saw the Headmaster smirking.

"Until now, this band of idiotic subversives has been mostly harmless. They have been nothing but filthy red agitators. But those of you whose letterboxes were polluted this morning will know that they have upped their game. They are playing dirty, and so we must remain ever-vigilant and play dirty right back."

There was a small smattering of applause – most people, whether in agreement or not, were too scared to move.

"I have reason to believe," the Mayor continued, with a slower, more sombre tone, "that the perpetrators of these monstrous pamphlets are students at this very school."

When he delivered the last word of his elegiac statement, there was a collective gasp. Up until now, Remus had thought that collective gasps only happened in comic books or at the pictures. _Consider me disproven_, he thought.

"Over the next hour, my trained colleagues will be questioning randomly selected students from all grades as to what they know about the Marauders."

However, as one of the drones read out the list of students to be questioned, it was clear that to a degree, there was nothing random about this selection. The general trend was that the students from known left-wing families and known far right families were called. The left would be the ones they'd sweat for information, and they'd be expecting the right to have scouted out the likely candidates already. Remus thought that this was mildly ridiculous, as most of the left-wing families in town were as anti-Communist as the right. But of course Mayor Riddle saw everything in the most simplistic of terms.

When a "neutral" student was summoned, they were a known troublemaker. Remus, who had been holding his breath while the list was read out, was thanking the non-existent Lord that his name was omitted. However, three notable inclusions on this list were James, Sirius and Peter: James, from arguably the most progressive family in town, Sirius, from conservative stock, and Peter, guilty by association.

"Lucky break," Sirius whispered to Remus as they were leaving the Hall. Peter had gone to the bathroom to throw up, and Sirius was walking towards the designated interrogation rooms.

Remus nodded. "Good luck," he said. "Don't give anything away."

Before Sirius could respond, McGonagall swept past them. "Potter is away today, is that correct?"

They nodded, and she disappeared as far as she'd appeared.

Sirius laughed awkwardly. "As if I would give anything away! I'll play the parent card. Pretend I'm as backward as they are, and I'll get off clean. You wait and see."

"I'm sure you'll be fine," Remus said. "You're a good liar."

Sirius smiled despite evident nerves. "Well if you have faith in me, what could possibly go wrong?"

Peter emerged from the bathroom and joined them, but he was still looking faint. "C'mon, Sirius. We'd better hurry."

"I guess," Sirius said, grimacing. "See you later, Remus."

"See you," Remus said, frowning as Peter dragged Sirius away.

"THE REST OF YOU CAN GO BACK TO CLASS," boomed a teacher at the crowds leaving the Hall.

Remus really didn't think he could. He located Lily and dragged her aside. "Are you up for skipping out on the rest of the day?"

She looked around nervously before nodding. "Sounds good. I don't think I can go back to class after that display of disgusting... disgustingness."

They were seniors, so it was easy enough for them to duck out unquestioned. People would just presume they had a free period. There was a small café on the outskirts of the city centre that had good lunch and no qualms about serving people who should really be doing other things called the Hog's Head, and it was a convenient fifteen-minute walk from the school. They took a table near the back and sat down to lunch.

"I'm so scared," Lily admitted in a whisper as they were waiting for their food to arrive. "I'm so worried someone will say something... that'll lead back to one of you..."

"Me too," Remus said. "But I know Sirius and Peter will keep their mouths shut. They're good friends."

Lily smiled. "It's probably for the best James is sick today. You just _know_ he'd want to leap up and take all the credit." She gave a cackle at the thought.

Remus forced a laugh. It was frighteningly close to the truth.

"But seriously," Lily said after a moment. "I don't want anything to happen to James. Just like, I suppose, you'd be heartbroken if anything happened to Sirius, and vice versa."

He nodded.

"It's just that," she continued, "well... Remus, can I trust you with a secret?"

"I've been told that I'm fantastic at keeping secrets," he said confidently.

She gulped and leant in closer. "I'm... I've got one in the oven," she whispered. "And James is the father. Well. Obviously. It's just that... this is going to change our lives. I won't be able to go to college when school finishes, because I'll have this thing to look after. And I'm going to need James's help."

Remus could do nothing but keep nodding. He couldn't think of anything to say. If he'd had his suspicions, he'd put them aside.

Thankfully for his ineloquence, the waiter arrived with their lunch. He handed it to them and gave Remus a wink as he walked off, as though to say "good luck with the girl". If he didn't have much more serious things on his mind, Remus would have laughed outright.

"James will be fine, won't he?" Lily asked, as though needing confirmation.

Remus wished he could promise her. He wished he could say that James's name wouldn't turn up once during the questioning, that no snotty fool with a grudge would bring him up out of spite.

He gulped, reaching across the table and putting a completely platonic hand over Lily's. "He'll be fine," he said.

The tone lightened considerably when the food came. Lily cheered up and began gossiping about her sister's social life – which, it seemed, was full of more intrigue than one might expect – and about her plans for when school ended.

"I'm hoping for a girl, to be honest," she said quietly. "My parents always said they were so lucky to have two girls. My mum was one of six, all boys except her, and she's pretty sure that's why her parents died young."

Ignoring that last flippant but rather poignant comment, Remus asked if she'd thought of any ideas for names.

"Oh, well, I'll consult with James, obviously," she said, adding somewhat shamefacedly "once I've told him."

Remus gaped at her. "You haven't told him?"

"I'm waiting for the right moment," she mumbled. "You know how James is. He's always excited about something. I can't quite bring myself to burst any of his bubbles yet."

He nodded. That had certainly killed the mood. "So, uh, names?"

"Oh, yes! Well, I've always thought that Rose was a nice name for a little girl. Or Harriet. I don't know why, but I really like Harriet."

"Harriet is nice," Remus agreed.

"Harriet Potter," she said slowly, testing the sound of the name. "You know what, that has a rather nice ring to it!"

"It's nice, yeah. I'm not sure how James will feel about it, though... I get the impression that he's into ridiculous names."

"Well, the baby gets his surname. So I suppose it's only fair I get to name it."

Remus could see no issues with that at all.

"Although, knowing James," Lily continued, "he'll be angling for a little boy to make into some sort of twisted protégé. _Harry_ Potter."

She snorted, and Remus couldn't help but laugh a bit. "It's not as good as Harriet, is it?" he said. "It sort of sounds like the name you'd give to a juvenile character in a children's book."

"It does, doesn't it?" Lily mused. "But I suppose we'll work something out eventually."

"Of course you will," Remus said consolingly. What with the state of things, it was one of the few things about which he could be certain.

When they'd finished their rather needlessly long lunch, it was just about the time that school would be ending, so they headed back in that direction. Remus would meet Sirius and with any luck they would kiss their worries away. Lily decided that her services were needed elsewhere.

"I'm going to head to James's instead."

"Sounds like a good idea," Remus said.

"Yeah," she said, nodding. "I'll fill him in on all the things he's missed. And maybe some things that he ought to know..."

Remus gave her an encouraging pat on the shoulder. "He'll like that bit of good news. You know, something to be glad about amongst all this nonsense."

Lily smiled nervously, not unlike Sirius had when going in for questioning earlier that day. "I sure hope so."

They parted ways and Remus stood outside the school, bouncing up on his heels as he watched swathes of students leaving and not one of them Sirius.

Just his luck, the one person he really _didn't want to see_ turned up at his side, glaring at him.

"What do you want?" Remus snapped, glowering at Severus.

"Sirius," he said, and Remus immediately regretted his kneejerk reaction of piqued attention. Severus smiled smugly and continued. "He was sweating when he came out of the interview," he said. "He looked like he'd just had the worst experience of his life. White as a sheet. Close to tears."

Remus narrowed his eyes. "And why are you telling me this?"

Severus sighed. "Can you really not tell?"

"No I _can't_ fucking tell," Remus growled, "all the last times we've conversed I've been under the impression that you _hated_ me."

Severus laughed calmly. "You _idiot_. I've never _hated _you. You've never gone out of your way to make my life into a living hell. But the people who _have,_ they love you. James and Sirius. You're their weakness, Remus. And the best way to get to them has always been through you. Don't take it personally."

"Don't take it—_don't take it personally_? What the fuck else am I supposed to do?"

"Stop cussing at me, for one," Severus said, still emotionless. "I'm just trying to help you out, Remus. Because things are going to start happening soon, and you've never been as bad as James and Sirius. You don't deserve what they have coming to them."

Remus just stared at him – honestly, he had no idea what the lunatic meant. He tried to think back to that afternoon. Had Snape been on the list of those questioned? No. No, he definitely hadn't. So where was he getting this shit?

"Look, I'm not in the mood for this rubbish," Remus said. "Can you—can you just leave me alone?"

"Your funeral," Severus said, quirking an eyebrow. He turned and walked away.

A few minutes of deep thought later, Sirius emerged, looking almost as pale as Severus had described him.

"How was it?" Remus asked immediately.

"Awful," Sirius said, and Remus noticed a slight tremor in his speech. "It was sickening, Remus, the things they asked. Fucking Peter, man, he chucked all over his interviewer in the first five minutes or something. He had to be sent home."

Remus bit his lip. "I'm glad it's all over."

"Yeah, where did you disappear to?" Sirius asked. By now they were about half-way between the school and the bookstore.

"Lily and I ditched and went out for lunch," Remus said. "Oh, and, to where did you disappear."

Sirius smiled despite himself. "Yeah, yeah. Sorry. I'm glad you two were having a good time."

"Sorry," Remus echoed.

"Let's stop before this turns into some sort of pity party," Sirius said, and Remus couldn't have agreed more.

They reached the bookstore and stood in the doorway for a few minutes, browsing the latest arrivals.

"I wish I'd been James today," Sirius said. "Too sick to come to school. Man, he had it easy."

Remus nodded. "It's very lucky for him. But Lily's just gone over there now to fill him in."

"Speak of the devil," Sirius said, gesturing to the street outside.

Sure enough, Lily was dashing up towards the bookstore, her red hair unmistakeable even from a distance. Remus could instantly tell that something was wrong, and one quick shared look told him that Sirius had twigged too.

They stepped outside and Lily came crashing into them, flinging herself at Remus and clinging on to him. It took him a moment of surreal absentmindedness to realise that she was sobbing.

"Lily!" he exclaimed, grabbing her into a tight hug. "What's happened?"

The first thought that crossed his mind was that James had not reacted well to the news of her pregnancy.

For not the first time that day, he was totally unprepared for what came next.

"It's _awful_," she said. "They've arrested James!"

* * *

Don't forget to **leave a review**! They really make my day. Even if it's just to yell at me for being a lazy writer. Go on. Do it. Review it.

Aaaanyway, it's getting interesting now, isn't it? More _actual plot development_ to come next time...

- _Legs_ :D


End file.
